THE BUXTON/Friendship community for some years has been spoiled and soiled by a season of death and bloodshed. It was during a time of criminal uprising, and even as individuals and organizations attempt to take back the community’s stolen pride, the road seems desolate and rocky for some to traverse.

Some residents at Friendship Backdam – a good distance from the former Train Line – say they are still in much pain, so much so that there is a burning desire for someone to even visit and say something to assure them that their names are still inked on the plan of ‘the good life’.
With the bulldozed pride of the Buxton Spice in an attempt to flush out criminals, some of the residents told the Guyana Chronicle that while the backdam gardens are taking quite some time to flourish the same way again, farmers are trying their hands at pigeon peas and a few other temporary crops. But they yearn for a replanting of the sweetest and most desired mango grown in Guyana.

“From since they come and grade down we things behind deh, nothing really big ain’t going on because you know mango tree is 10 and 15 years for them to grow fuh geh back how they went when dem bulldoze it,” one resident explained.
Even after calls have been made for help, the resident say they still haven’t seen any. And while they have no properly fixed avenue for income, recreational facilities are not really available. A makeshift playground was created out of empty house lots, one on which Maude Hatton was slayed by a drug addicted mass-murderer ( Baby Arthur) who went berserk and butchered his mother Hyacinth Headly and five other persons along with a dog, on December
9, 1994. Headley was shot dead by police minutes later.

The yard-space playground, even with haunting memories, provides a
place of sport to adults and children alike, but there is no fear of a resurrection of such times even as the heat is on in a different way. Youths said they are looking to head in a positive direction, and while some do not want to leave their families, others have travelled to the hinterland with the hope of making it.
A woman who had lost two of her sons in the upheaval, said the Buxton/Friendship community, especially in the area most affected, had become depressed and drained of motivation.

“This community now deh in such stress and poverty that the people really ain’t making no push. They don’t really push nothing up here,” she told the Chronicle.
A young male resident said further, “Right now nothing ain’t going on at the back here because the government ain’t get no time wid we. The minute we tell we self we need a change … It ain’t mek no sense, like we bring exchange, no change! We ain’t getting work and we get children fuh mine,” he said.

Some residents of Buxton/Friendship had long complained that their Buxton addresses had become the point of disqualification for jobs whenever they sought employment, so many of them are left unemployed. Even after calls have been made for help, some young residents say nothing has changed and they were now feeling more convinced that they were the rejected ones.

Crime was excessively high in the East Coast Demerara community for years at a time when Guyana’s crime rate had skyrocketed – 2003 and beyond – and it was publicly known that the area had become a haven for criminals. But Buxtonians maintained that criminal elements were imported into the area through a deliberate plan to demonize the community, creating an environment of bloodshed and unrest.
As Ritchie Spice sang ‘Earth a run red’, so did the community of Buxton/Friendship run red with blood day by day after five Camp Street jail convicts, armed and dangerous, escaped from the Georgetown penitentiary on Mash Day in 2003.

It was also believed that another wanted man Rondell Rawlins called ‘Fineman’ dwelled within the community from time to time, creating havoc there and in other parts of the country. Rawlins emerged the most notorious criminal and was fingered in both the Lusignan and Bartica massacres which left over 22 persons – including children and police officers – dead. He was later killed in a police operation.
Many who traverse the East Coast Demerara roadways dreaded passing the community and some residents were tormented – some mercilessly gunned down – by both criminals and police. The young men who spoke to the Guyana Chronicle, all in their twenties, were teenagers during the times of the violent uproar, which motivated an almost full-time presence of police and the Guyana Defense Force (GDF) in the area.

Now they have grown and feel the effects of the destruction. A 28-year-old man said he does not see it possible to have a happy family in such a situation and has decided to postpone marriage until about the age of 59.
He explained: “Nah like I freelancing, just spending that time fuh mek life more better. But I can’t depend on the government fuh mek it more better for me because I trying… we vote for (change) and we ain’t see nothing happening fuh we that we geh a job… we ain’t see nothing happening we still gah fight fuh we self. We cyan heights pon nobody we gah heights fuh we self because nobody ain’t coming and seh well boy wha yuh want we do fuh y’all… like bring two excavator or something or two bulldozer and seh y’all gon clear up a nice place and y’all farm or something.”

Journalist Ronald Waddell, who was assassinated outside his home in Georgetown was the only person who attempted to help make their lives better with motivational communication, and encouraged them to invest in backland farmlands to survive. Now that he is gone, they are crying for the help of others
“We like fuh see somebody real big at least we could talk and see something wha could happening fuh we. Most obviously we would like to see somebody like that. We don’t see them face duh,” a young man said.

He complained of police harassment, pointing out that though patrols are not as frequent as before, jeeploads of the lawmen visiting resurrect past fears and usually result in residents running helter-skelter. Several of the men gather at a hang-out spot early Sunday night with nothing much left to do. Though none of their immediate families were victims of the killing spree, they have experienced the scare without a word of counsel.
“The shooting stop because them ain’t shooting nobody but the harassment ain’t stop. We still deh in hey and see three, four (police) vehicle coming down hey and you scared you ain’t itating fuh sit down deh no more because the harassment with them yuh itating fuh run, and when yuh run now sometime yuh run into them hand.”

While police boast good relationships with many communities countrywide, he said the way the lawmen approach and communicate with the people aback Buxton/Friendship does not accommodate for residents having a friendly relationship nor trusting the police force again.
“The force how they coming to people ain’t must scared. When yuh look up the road three vehicle with bout twenty man pon one, who ain’t gon frighten as a one man or a two man? You ain’t know wha dem comin for really, wha really gyin on wid them so people run when they see dem because remember now we done live in duh already because when we see them they only brutalizing, brutalizing people. So when we see dem we running,” he explained.