Dear Editor,
I am reaching out publicly to request compensation for the substantial preliminary development, adaptation and programme planning, budgeting, and research I undertook between March 2025 and February 2026 requested by the Ministry of Human Service and Social Security pertaining to adapting and rolling out the Partner Assault Response (PAR) Programme. The PAR Programme is a court ordered early intervention programme that engaged men primarily using a specific methodology.
For more than a decade, I maintained a close and productive working relationship with the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security, during which I provided technical support, training, policy work, programme concepts, strategic direction, operational frameworks, and institutional development work that later became embedded within Ministry initiatives.
It is important to state plainly that some of the concepts, programme directions, and policy measures publicly promoted by the ministry over the past few years were brought to the ministry by me and the team I worked with at the time. In other instances, work was supported by United Nations agencies that retained my services. I have said it before and will say it now, the MHSSS is the most important ministry in Guyana – the vast majority of persons accessing services are low-income earners and Guyanese living in, and experiencing tremendous socio-economic hardships.
These contributions included:
All of this work including more were designed from the ground up with the intention to engage people directly affected, local and institutional expertise and service users where applicable from Baramita, to Charity to the East Coast and East Bank of Demerara, I met and engaged hundreds of people.
The proposed adaptation of the PAR Programme emerged from this same pattern. Drawing on my certification as an Ontario PAR Facilitator, my experience in gender-based violence programming, and my exposure to perpetrator intervention systems, I introduced the idea of studying, adapting, and implementing elements of the PAR model within Guyana to strengthen accountability, better support men, reduce domestic violence recidivism, and create a structured, evidence-based, early intervention responses; punishing perpetrators alone does not reduce GBV rates as we all can attest to in Guyana.
At the minister’s direct and documented request, I subsequently undertook extensive preliminary adaptation work between March 2025 and March 2026. During our engagements, the minister repeatedly emphasised the importance of keeping trusted people around the ministry’s work and stated directly that she wanted to “keep me around” as part of the ministry’s broader domestic violence and social services initiatives. I even shared some institutional concerns with her that I thought she should be aware of. Those assurances, together with the ministry’s request for a budget, symposium planning, adaptation materials, operational frameworks, and implementation concepts, reinforced the agreed plan that after planning and preparation I would lead the full adaptation. This was the agreed plan, to prepare the preliminary outputs and lead implementation.
In reliance on those representations, I completed substantial preliminary work, including:
PAR Guyana was also being supported by a Canadian PAR facilitator, a university professor and a legal non-profit that communicated their interest to collaborate and which the ministry is aware of. These engagements reflected the seriousness of the initiative and the effort being made.
Despite these substantial contributions, professional labour, and intellectual input, I have not been compensated for the extensive preliminary planning and preparation work undertaken.
The situation became particularly concerning when, after I had already completed and submitted substantial work — including a request for the PAR budget and budget narrative by the budget office and communicated directly to me by Dr. Cona Husbands, Director of the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Policy Unit – I received correspondence on February 26, 2026 from the minister stating that the symposium was “on hold,” that the ministry would execute the work internally, and that PAR was “not confirmed as the only programme” under consideration.
In closing, I remain open to working with the ministry and President Ali’s administration, I have close friends, mentors and colleagues who are well placed in the government and I have never experienced what I have described above. I have consistently maintained that there is only one political administration in Guyana with the institutional reach, regional influence, and international relationships capable of advancing transformational social development initiatives at scale. However, we need to be mindful of some things that might turn people off and away from the administration, and value people whose focus is serving the people of Guyana, not politics, especially when said people embrace and understand the vision of the current administration.
I am an email or phone call away and have always been ready to engage,