COVID-19: an opportunity for digital transformation through regional collaboration

Dear Editor,
General Secretary of the PNCR, Amna Ally in her statement on July 24 stated that “If the coalition has a programme and the coalition executes it, that is not anybody else’s business…” – yet another example of executive lawlessness.
Everyone knows the APNU/AFC big wigs head – General Secretary and Campaign Manager, Joe Harmon, Chairman and General Secretary of the PNC, Mrs Volda Lawrence and Ms Amna Ally, respectively – are in total control of the National COVID-19 Task Force.
This body has issued COVID-19 legal measures, most recently in the July 16 Official Gazette, which prohibits any form of social gathering or social activity. Under these measures, the police have been given powers to stop such gatherings.
We have witnessed the same party flouting these measures over and over again with public gatherings and protests with participants either not wearing masks or wearing masks as decorations around their necks and chins, and having no regard for social distancing etc. We have seen this in gatherings in Linden, Friendship and Plaisance, Agricola, outside of State House, each time the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) meets, and, in front of the Magistrates’ Courts, the Court of Appeal and the US Embassy.
The decision of the APNU/AFC coalition to hold a series of community meetings, whether indoors (worse) or outdoors, in various regions at the same time that the number of persons infected with COVID-19 is rapidly increasing, is unconscionable.
The Commissioner of Police must answer whether he or any of his Commanders have given permission for these meetings, and further why has he not put a stop to them.
Our country is in the throes of two crises – one is a political crisis, after 145 days with no declaration of the recount results after the March 2, 2020 General and Regional Elections; and, the other is a public health crisis. The two are intrinsically connected and intertwined as our nation moves towards a humanitarian crisis the longer it takes for the declaration of the recount results which continue to be blocked by the APNU/AFC. Both are crises of democracy, human rights, rule of law and inclusive governance.
The PNCR General Secretary’s defiance of COVID-19 measures mirrors the APNU/AFC coalition’s rejection of the results of the recount and repudiation of the report of the Caricom scrutinising team, the July 8 rulings of the CCJ and the July 20 ruling of the Chief Justice.
Amna Ally is part of the Granger’s gang of brigands who have no conscience, no desire to put country and people first but are prepared to do everything to stay in Government, regardless of the consequences.
While the people of this country are suffering, while health workers across this country are asked to function in very risky conditions with very limited protection equipment, pharmaceuticals and medical supplies, and health facilities are stretched with limited staff, the PNC (APNU/AFC same difference) focus is on misleading and mobilising supporters to challenge the inevitable declaration. This illustrates their utter disdain for our people.
The management of the pandemic is hopelessly floundering in a ‘green sea of neglect, ineptitude and arrogance’.
The PNC/APNU/AFC squatters cannot manage the basics of a pandemic – the combination of “men, machines and money”, coordinated in such way that resources – human, technical and financial – are distributed and available in an efficient manner where it is needed.
Not to forget, Mrs Lawrence, Chairperson of the PNC, who was busy on the campaign trail dolling out taxpayers’ dollars under the green and yellow banner when the WHO warned that there was a global pandemic. On March 5, she was busy signing Clairmont Mingo’s fraudulent declaration of results for Region Four, not paying attention to preparing Guyana for the pandemic.
In the interim between January 17 to March 1 with the first case, there was no expeditious procurement of personal protective equipment – gloves, N95 masks, surgical masks, medical isolation gowns and caps, face shields, and isolation suits to protect the health workers who would be in the front line; no procurement of PCR test kits, no procurement of drugs and supplies.
This lack of action contrasted sharply with previous expenditures by the said Ministry of $100 billion over the last five years; billions of dollars were spent on the procurement of drugs for “emergencies” without going to tender. COVID-19 has not been treated as an emergency. In contrast, there appears to have been no shortage of money when the Government decided to spend $1 billion on refurbishing and retrofitting a dilapidated privately-owned hotel into a “COVID-19 Sanitorium”. Shrouded in secrecy, this, too, will be added to the pile of scandals exposed in the Annual Reports of the Office of the Auditor General.
More focused on elections, the Commander-in-Chief neglected to act to assist the Guyana Defence Force, the Guyana Police Force, the Guyana Fire and Ambulance Services to procure masks, gloves and other protective gear as they too would be on the frontline.
The Guyana Prison Service, with 1200 inmates and hundreds of staff, also received no assistance. Their non-solution has been to release large numbers of prisoners.
The Ministry of Social Protection made no proper preparations for those in institutional care in homes for the elderly, orphanages, special needs children, etc. The fact that the Minister lives opposite the Palms and ignored the risks to the staff and clients therein is disgraceful. But what about the other homes for the elderly and special needs children who have run out of funding for food and cleaning supplies? These agencies have been seeking assistance over the last few months and have been told repeatedly they have to wait, there is no money.
By April 5, almost 3 weeks after the first case, there were 24 confirmed cases. By April 11, only 193 tests had been done, of which 51 were positive (45+6 deaths). This means 26 per cent of all tested were positive. Regrettably, these early figures did not send off alarm bells and move the Task Force into high gear to address this pandemic and protect our people, especially the most vulnerable. We are now paying for that initial loss of precious time.
There was no reason in this early period why the Ministry of Public Health with available supplies of test kits (thanks to the PAHO) restricted the allocation of test kits to Regions One, Seven, Eight, and Nine to between three-five each in the first 3 months. These are the same regions which now have the highest percentage of cases with numbers climbing daily. As usual, the usurpers take no responsibility but blame the transmission on outsiders entering the country, again deflecting from their ineptitude.
The Deputy Chief Medical Officer, in a July 22 media report, provided the incidence rate by region. She had said: “Even though the numbers in Region Four are higher, you are on average 9.5 times more likely to be infected in Region One than in Region Four and you are seven times more likely to get infected in Region Seven, than in Region Four.”
Yet over the last six months, there has been no health teams parachuted into these regions to go to the Amerindian Village Councils, give them advice, carry out awareness programmes, do mass testing and contract tracing, (not helicopter visits) but sustained presence as required in a public health crisis. This is a serious indictment of the Granger-led National COVID-19 Task Force and all involved.
The same DCMO made an astounding revelation that Guyana has a “very high” COVID-19 death rate for a country with less than a million people, approx. 17.6 per cent. As of July 26, cases have jumped to 370 and 20 deaths; this will continue to increase exponentially as forecast.
Why then is it that the people in Moruca, which is the main epicentre with the largest number of cases in the region, can only be tested on Sundays when the aircraft comes in? Why are persons in quarantine there receiving 3 small bottles of water per day? Why is the complaint about the quality of food universal in all quarantine and isolation institutions run by the Ministry of Public Health? Why are some people still in quarantine in Moruca and other places across the country for as long as six weeks and waiting 2 weeks for a test result at a time?
Why do people in Moruca have to call Mabaruma Hospital trying to find out about their test results and receive no help? Can one blame the Morucans if they do not trust the Health Ministry and feel that they are being neglected because they voted for the PPP?
Instead, the Ministry of Public Health spent a fortune sending in several chartered flights to Moruca daily to pick up one test at a time. In the early stages, the area where the cases were emerging from was less than 3 miles in circumference. Inaction once again has caused the rapid increase in cases.
Now the Itabac community in Region Eight has 2 cases, and no one has gone in from the health sector to speak to the community or carry out tests and contract tracing.
The situation in the health facilities is dread, especially again in the interior. Hospitals and health centres (in many communities the nearest hospital is 15 miles or one day by boat) are reporting stretched and stressed human resources, begging for weeks for more drugs and medical supplies, limited or no money to travel to communities and very limited funds to feed people in institutional quarantine and isolation.
Toshaos in Amerindian villages are doing what they can to protect their communities and close down access to the communities. A few days ago, the South Rupununi District Council (SRDC) decided to lock down all 21 Indigenous communities in light of five positive COVID cases across three villages. The SRDC reported, like other regions, that it takes almost one week for sick patients to be tested, even after reporting symptoms associated with COVID-19. There is an additional waiting time to receive the results. The Toshao of Aishalton stated that with only five health workers to service a community of over 1265 people, “We are not prepared in any way.”
In Kamwatta Hill, Region One, the Toshao said: “Nobody from the Ministry come to enlighten us on what is going to take place…. Everybody right now is out of jobs. We’re facing almost a food crisis because we cannot get money, we cannot get a job…”
No food relief has been sent in by the COVID-19 Task Force to these areas, but the GDF Skyan has been used to take in construction materials for a Minister’s husband who has had the majority of contracts in that region.
The Ministry of Agriculture has been missing in action (is there a Minister there still?) with no form of help with seeds, baby chicks, or rice for example, to these communities.
While refusing to demit office, the band of brigands has not distributed cloth masks to the public, food relief to families, especially the poor and vulnerable across the country, no financial assistance to working people or those made unemployed by the closure of businesses etc, no relief to the farmers and business community. Yet at the community meeting in Linden, it is said that Amna Ally was giving out $30,000 to select families.
The PNC has once again lived up to its legacy – squandermania, mismanagement, corruption and abandonment of our people in the face of a public health crisis.
In contrast, the President-elect, Irfaan Ali established the National COVID-19 Response Stakeholders Forum on March 28, 2020, and that grouping has mobilised hundreds of volunteers to sew and distribute 200,000 cloth masks in all 10 regions and distributed over 150,000 food hampers from April to today to the poor and vulnerable, as well as supplies of protection equipment, medical supplies and cleaning fluids, to health workers and facilities.
This is what the Granger-led Task Force should have been doing all along, but once again it has failed the people.
Their time is up; they cannot continue to ruin this country and punish the people. Time to go!

Yours faithfully,
Gail Teixeira