– stories of survival, loss, and pain from people affected by road accidents
By Ravena Gildharie
ALMOST every week, there are reports of road accidents and incidents, some deadly, like the two most recent occurrences in Berbice and on the West Bank Demerara, which claimed the lives of a total of seven persons including five youths. Even as Guyana prepares to observe National Road Safety Month, come November, we must remember that the loss of lives is never acceptable for any human and neither are the physical injuries sometimes painful and life-altering that survivors suffer. Moreover, the emotional scars left behind are a heavy burden laid on families and survivors, that no amount of time can seem to heal.

If we knew their stories, their sufferings, their trauma we can somehow take it upon ourselves to be better road users?
Take for instance Uttamkumar Iurdeen, a 32-year-old former teacher of Pomona, Essequibo Coast. Eleven years ago, he was an active man who had just relocated to Industry, East Coast Demerara, with his wife, who was attending the teachers’ training college. The couple had a young son, then not yet a year old. Isurdeen had quit his teaching job and made the move to support his wife’s dream.

He took a job in construction to support his family financially. One Saturday, he was travelling back home in a minibus from his worksite at Victoria. There was a crash and Isurdeen was in the front seat. After hitting a car, the bus toppled several times before it landed on a fence. Pulled from the wreckage, Isurdeen was unable to move. His life had been altered forever.
But it wasn’t the event that hit him hard. It was the series of agony, physical and emotional pains that keep rolling on through time, even as Isurdeen bravely fights to overcome the odds.

“Drivers should be aware of the effects they have on other people’s lives…They have a responsibility for lives. If they cause people to die, it is one thing and if you survive, look at how you can live in disaster,” he said. He expressed disgust at the practice of cramming passengers like ‘sardines’, into buses, loud and vulgar music and speeding – all of which passengers seemingly accept from time to time.

After months of painful physical therapy based on doctors’ advice that there is a 50/50 chance of regaining mobility, Isurdeen has come to accept his fate but remains an ardent advocate for not only road safety but, awareness on many other social issues. Just recently, he took part in the Cancer Awareness Walk.
His son is now 11 years old and Isurdeen, wheelchair-bound, ensures they both enjoy father-son time at cricket matches and other public events. But the pain is sometimes unbearable. The loss of his freedom is even more distressing, especially since he observed that many businesses and locations in Guyana are not convenient or caters for physically challenged persons.

ALONE
“Then there is the shame,” Isurdeen pointed out, noting the stares he endures when out with his family especially at social events.
“I does go to Giftland Mall for example and people would stare at me like they have never seen someone in a wheelchair before. I wasn’t born this way. An accident caused me to be like this but, I am not dead. I still have my life to live,” Isurdeen related.
Gilia Torres-Amin, 27, is another accident survivor, who lost the two main members of her family, her mother and grandmother, 10 years ago in an accident on the Soesdyke/Linden Highway. She was just 16 at the time and just about to write the then-CXC examinations. Suffering a broken hip and head injuries, Gilia was forced to take on the motherly responsibility of her one-year-old sister who also survived the crash.

At the time, the family was heading to Linden on an afternoon outing with friends. Both of the older Torres women died on the spot. Gilia’s whole life was changed and even today, now with a family of her own, she finds it emotionally painful to remember the event and resulting struggles.
“Somethings you just don’t forget not even if you try hard to…It was such a difficult time for me after the accident. I had to learn to live without the two people who were closest to me, who I depended on to provide and care for me,” Gilia related. She was forced to live with several relatives and depended on their financial aid, up until she completed CXC and secured a job to provide for herself and sister. Time has moved on but, Gilia is still troubled by the memories of that dreadful event.

A MOTHER’S PAIN
On July 18, 2011 another family was thrown into mourning after an accident on Homestretch Avenue, Georgetown. Doris Shelto lost a part of her heart, a son, the second of five boys.
“My whole world was turned upside down when I lost my son,” Shelto said. In the prime of his youth, Elron Peter Mc Lennon, 27, a community Drainage and Irrigation (D&I) foreman of ‘B’ Field Sophia, died clutching his two nephews who he was taking back to their home when the vehicle collided with another and toppled several times on the roadway. At first, Shelto withdrew from society and spent months indoors crying and praying for strength to move on and help her sons who were very close to their brother. The grief was so immense on the family that Shelto’s mother died three months later. Though she was sickly, the elderly woman had a strong bond with her deceased grandson.

The day after his death, Shelto took to the streets in protest against reckless road use and to sensitise the public on the need to stand up against such behaviour before suffering the loss she endured.
“My son was a beautiful child. I can never get over the pain…I have found healing in my volunteer work with the children but it is still a pain I won’t wish on any mother,” Shelto expressed. She has since erected a cross on the site of the accident which she hopes would serve as a remembrance of the lives that were cut down by accident and create awareness for better road use.

“Commuters must understand that the sole reason for the existence of the minibus/taxi industry is the commuter and his/her demands for transportation. Therefore the most powerful person is we the commuters…we must speak out against the speeding to save lives,” the grieving mother advocated.
“People need to realise that the vehicle is a deadly weapon and we need to exercise caution every day. Practice the Five Cs, especially common sense,” urges Ramona Doorgen of the Guyana National Road Safety council. She noted that too many lives have been lost and much more affected by accidents.

The GNRC is already moving to have trained counsellors to offer support to survivors and relatives of those deceased due to accidents.
As of June this year, the Guyana Police Force (GPF) Traffic Department Statistics reported a 29.3 per cent decrease in fatal accidents for the year thus far, as compared to last year, yet, the fatal accidents within the past two weeks are a stark reminder that work must continue to be done in order to ensure that vehicle users exercise maximum caution while on the roadways, as the results of misuse are often times detrimental and life changing. National Road Safety Awareness Month will be launched on November 1, in Berbice this year, and among its many activities will include a candle light vigil as well as its ‘White Knight’ Campaign, a collaborative effort between the Guyana Police Force and the GNRC that aims to encourage all road users to decline from driving drunk, designate a driver and to restrict the escalation of road accidents; as well as reaching the United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety of a 50 per cent decrease in fatal accidents by 2020.