The Guyana Police Force’s (GPF’s) Fallen Heroes Foundation is continuing to financially support the families of Police Officers killed in the line of duty, giving the beneficiaries another disbursement on Friday.
Cheques totalling almost $900,000 were handed over to the families of nine slain Police Officers at the Police Officers’ Mess Annex, Eve Leary. The money is to assist with the welfare and/or schooling expenses of children under 18 years of those fallen heroes.
Currently, the Foundation is catering for 20 children.
The establishment of the Fallen Heroes Foundation was the brainchild of Police
Police Commissioner Seelall Persaud and Members of the Fallen Heroes Foundation along with the families of the slain officers
Commissioner Seelall Persaud, who at the simple presentation ceremony highlighted the importance of the organisation as well as the need for increased donations to the Foundation.
“We are not sure what will happen in the future. We would like to see that the number of children that are being taken care of doesn’t increase but there is no guarantee, life doesn’t offer those guarantee. Then the level of assistance they provide, there are opportunities to improve on that if they can acquire more funding,” Persaud noted.
The Top Cop is hoping that by highlighting the work of the Foundation, there will be increased donations. In fact, he added that upon his retirement in April, he will get more involved in the work of the Foundation, trying to raise funds to expand its support to the beneficiaries.
The Fallen Heroes Foundation was established in 2015 and according to Chairman, Pastor Raphael Massiah, an assessment is done on each family to determine their needs.
“Each family is quite different so every year we do an assessment to determine the particular needs… things like school fees, uniform, we look at footwear, lesson fees and so on. We have even made a contribution of a laptop to one child who was writing CXC but did not have that kind of resource so it depends on the peculiarities that we find in a family that will determine the amount that is given,” the Chairman explained.
The financial assistance is given to the families quarterly. The money is raised through public donations as well as monthly contributions by ranks of the Police Force. In order to maintain transparency and accountability, audits have been conducted for the years 2015 and 2016. The auditing of the 2017 financial books will be done in the near future.
While the Foundation is an independent body from the Force itself, the Commissioner is nevertheless kept abreast of its work.
Speaking with reporters after receiving her cheque, Enola Pantlitz said the money comes in handy to care for her two children. “For me, I’m grateful for the money because it’s helping out a lot with the school fees and so forth,” said the widow. Her husband, Sherwayne Pantlitz was killed in 2013 during a standoff at Middle Street, Georgetown, during which miner Derrick Kanhai, shot and killed two officers and two civilians.
Meanwhile, the wife of Sergeant Constable Leonard La Rose, who was fatally stabbed while arresting a rape suspect in the North-West District in 2016, also related how helpful the assistance has been to care for four of her five children who are in school.
“It has helped me a great lot and I’m grateful and thankful for the assistance… (I use the money) to purchase their school books and whatever things are needed, I will use it to buy,” she stated.
At the end of 2016, the Guyana Police Force has disclosed that some 64 Police Officers were killed in the line of fire since 1913, with nine of them having lost their lives from 2010 to then.
However, adding to that is 39-year-old Police Corporal 16825 Balgrave Bartholomew of Itaballi, Mazaruni, Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni), who drowned while on patrol duty on January 30 last year.
It was reported that the officer along with his colleagues were returning from patrol duty along the Ekeruku River when the wooden boat they were in began to take in water from the bow and quickly sank. The two other occupants managed to swim to shore, but Corporal Bartholomew unfortunately could not.
