BISHOP Louis Jones and wife Sandra Jones are in Guyana to facilitate a number of consultations focusing on women’s issues but see it as a way of adding to the work already undertaken in Guyana. “We are not here to re invent the wheel, we are here to complement what is being done… it is said that ‘it is not what bad people do but when good people do nothing’,” Bishop Louis said.
Domestic violence and abuse will be the main topics to be addressed during the conferences that will span the counties of Berbice and Demerara and the other in Bartica, Region Seven. Efforts will also be made to target other regions of Guyana.
The couple brought their plans to President Bharrat Jagdeo, on Tuesday, during a meeting at the Office of the President.
Bishop Jones told the Government Information Agency (GINA) that the conferences will be free of cost and will commence in October this year. He disclosed that the establishment of a crisis intervention programme is on the cards, creating a niche for people to ventilate their feelings on their problems.
“We want to really empower women and children, also speaking to men about the ills people would talk about,” Bishop Jones said.
The Florida based Guyanese couple sees it as a way of giving back to the country of their birth on issues which they see as vices that place impediments on a society.
“We will be going in the community, making awareness and letting them know that there is hope and help out there,” Sandra Jones said.
Although the two are followers of the Christian faith their programme will also be targeting women from different religious backgrounds.
President Jagdeo has on several occasions been sharing similar sentiments about activism in curbing societal ills, bemoaning the way in which young women and children are subjected to brutal murders.
Recently, the Ministry of Labour Human Services and Social Security established the Men’s Affairs Bureau, a special unit for men to realise their true potential as fathers, husbands, parents and role models.
It patterns after the work of the Women’s Affairs Bureau which was established in 1981 to promote empowerment through welfare and general counselling, training in small business management. (GINA)