SHAR­LENE RAM­PER­SAD

The Guyanese Prime Min­is­ter is call­ing for his coun­try­men to stop their protest ac­tion over the vi­o­lent mur­ders of two teenagers, and a reprisal killing of an­oth­er teen, in Guyana, over the last few days.

Speak­ing to CNC3's Morn­ing Brew host, Na­talee Legore, Prime Min­is­ter Brigadier Mark Phillips cast blame square­ly on the shoul­ders of the Op­po­si­tion leader, Joseph Har­mon, say­ing Har­mon's state­ments to the griev­ing fam­i­lies in­cit­ed protests.

On Sun­day, the mu­ti­lat­ed bod­ies of cousins 18-year-old Joel Hen­ry, and 16-year-old Isa­iah Hen­ry, were found in a co­conut field in Cot­ton Tree Vil­lage, West Coast, Berbice.

The two had been miss­ing since Sat­ur­day when they left their Num­ber Three Vil­lage homes to pick co­conuts in Cot­ton Tree.

Their bod­ies were dis­cov­ered by their fam­i­lies on Sun­day af­ter­noon.

The own­er of the co­conut farm near to where their bod­ies was found was ar­rest­ed by po­lice.

By Mon­day, protests had bro­ken out in Num­bers Three, Four and Five Vil­lages in West Berbice over the mur­ders of the Hen­ry cousins.

Five peo­ple were ar­rest­ed in con­nec­tion with the mur­ders and as protest ac­tion con­tin­ued in West Berbice, a reprisal killing rocked the coun­try on Wednes­day.

A 17-year-old rel­a­tive of one of the mur­der ac­cused was chopped and beat­en to death on Wednes­day. Guyanese me­dia re­ports said Haresh Singh of Num­ber Three Vil­lage was mur­dered while on his way to his farm­land and his mo­tor­cy­cle set afire.

His killing caused more protests to erupt.

Speak­ing on the Morn­ing Brew on Thurs­day, Prime Min­is­ter Phillips said in the protests over the mur­ders of the Hen­ry cousins, pro­tes­tors were burn­ing homes, ve­hi­cles, rob­bing and even rap­ing peo­ple who try to get through road­blocks.

He put the blame for the protests on the leader of a Part­ner­ship for Na­tion­al Uni­ty/ Al­liance for Change (AP­NU/AFC) coali­tion, Joseph Har­mon.

Phillips said dur­ing Har­mon's vis­it to the Hen­ry fam­i­ly, he (Har­mon) told the griev­ing fam­i­ly to do what they felt was right to get jus­tice.

He claimed that Har­mon took a po­lice mat­ter and turned it in­to a po­lit­i­cal mat­ter. Phillips said in Guyana, pol­i­tics are syn­ony­mous with race and the mur­ders have in­cit­ed racial ten­sions be­tween Afro and In­do Guyanese.

When Legore point­ed out that Har­mon had called for an end to protests on Mon­day, Phillips re­peat­ed his claim that Har­mon had turned the is­sue in­to a po­lit­i­cal one.