Today, Guyana joins in the observance of International Day of World’s Indigenous Peoples 2023, themed: “Indigenous Youth as Agents of Change for Self-determination.”
On August 9 each year, this worldwide celebration is observed as on this date was held the first meeting in 1982, of the UN Working Group on Indigenous Populations. This Working Group was created to provide an opportunity for Indigenous people to share their experiences and raise their concerns for the attention of the international community.
Amerindian Affairs Minister Pauline Sukhai, in her message, said: “Indigenous youths have been taking their rightful place in advocacy and as agents for change in the promotion of Indigenous peoples’ rights in Guyana. More and more, we are seeing Indigenous youths being voted into offices and endowed with decision-making powers as Toshaos and Councillors. At the national level, the President of Guyana, recognising the huge power youths have as agents of change, has established a National Youth Council with advisory powers to ensure that there is inclusivity, encapsulating the Indigenous youthful voice in policy-making at the highest level. The Government of Guyana is invested in ensuring that it hones and builds the skills and capacity of our youths. Indigenous youths are primary targets in this developmental approach towards furthering meaningful change and development in their villages and communities.”
If one can recall at the launching of Amerindian Heritage Month after he was sworn into office in 2020, President Irfaan Ali laid out his Administration’s plans and programmes for the development of Guyana’s Indigenous peoples for the next five years.
It was indeed a detailed plan which included several critical components aimed at ensuring that Guyana’s First Peoples are not excluded in any way from the national development agenda.
To its credit, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Government has acknowledged that land is central to indigenous peoples’ development and always treated Amerindian lands demarcation and titling as a priority.
Further, it was very encouraging that since taking office the PPP Government has restored several development projects which were scrapped by the former A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Government. These include: rehiring the approximately 2000 Community Support Officers (CSOs) who were terminated by the previous APNU/AFC Government when it took office in 2015; reintroducing Community Development Plans (CDPs) to ensure that Amerindians are able to determine the sustainable livelihoods they desire; and returning to the ground-breaking partnership forged through the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) and advancing the innovative “opt-in” feature which allowed villages to benefit directly from the proceeds of carbon trading services.
In his address, the President had also promised that Amerindians can look forward to improvements in social services such as education, health care and water. He said that health facilities will be increased, upgraded and better equipped to provide enhanced and more accessible health care across the hinterlands. This indeed was badly needed as many hinterland residents at the time had to travel extremely long distances to access basic medical services.
Many of the health institutions in the hinterland for years did not offer the level of services required by patients and hence they were forced to travel to Georgetown at a very high cost. However, to its credit the telemedicine programme along with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)-funded new hinterland hospitals will greatly enhance healthcare in these far-flung communities.
The same situation had existed as it relates to educational opportunities for Amerindian students. However, this has changed significantly. However, we must note that many hinterland schools still do not have a full complement of trained teachers.
That said, we believe there is need for more collaboration between the Government and other development agencies to support and fund community development projects, skills training, etc, that would see Amerindians having better access to opportunities to advance their lives. This, along with the benefits from the carbon credits sale which will see millions of dollars being directed to these communities by the Government, is hope for a brighter future for our Indigenous communities.
