“My mother died and left us with this gift” – tearful homeowner

…as fire guts Herstelling house

Raphael Mohamed, a weeder of Lot 2 First Street, Herstelling Housing Scheme, could not hold back his tears on Wednesday afternoon, as he watched his family’s one-storey concrete home go up in flames, leaving six persons homeless.
When Guyana Times arrived at the scene, the house was completely destroyed. Mohamed said the family had been living at the house for the past 20 years.
“Me ah vibrate and I getting cold sweat… honestly like I can’t take it anymore. This is too much for me if I tell you the honest truth,” the distressed man related.
Mohamed strongly believes that his brother, who is an alcoholic, is responsible for the fire. He recalled that earlier in the day, his brother had threatened him.
“This morning [Wednesday] we had an argument and he told me that I would not live to inherit this house, so I told him ‘me not going to worry with you’. He walk up the road and come back with a big bottle of gas… he carry it inside and put it in the house…I went and find out from the people why he bring this gas… all them time he in deh in here nothing like this never happened,” the man explained.
Mohamed said after his brother’s threat’ he ignored him and left to go to a shop. However, sometime later, he received a phone call informing him that the house was on fire.

“By the time I left to go and upgrade my phone’ this is what I had to come and meet. This is the call that I get to come quick and get my key to bring out my car from the yard… everything burn up inside of there. Only yesterday I put $50,000 in there to save and that burn up too, this trip me out now.

“I have nothing more in this life left just the clothes that I got on. My mother died and left us with this gift and now this,” the tearful man explained.
Maureen Harvey, Mohamed’s neighbour who first saw the fire and alerted persons in the community, said that she had just awakened and went to call for one of the occupants of the home when she saw the flames.
“I got up and call for them, because I cooked for them and when l look, I see the fire coming from out from the second room by the window and I start screaming to bring out the neighbours. I don’t know who start the fire, I don’t know how the fire start, but it started from “Bald Head” room,” she said.

According to Mohamed, his brother, who allegedly started the fire, occupied the second room in the house. He said his brother had been an alcoholic for years and would usually get into fights with him over the property.
No one was injured in the blaze, and an investigation has been launched. (LaWanda McAllister)