Fear gripped Wakenaam

Last Updated on Saturday, 26 December 2015, 21:01 by GxMedia

As a Wakenaam business and his daughter remained hospitalised after a brutal attack by bandits, residents are recounting their reaction when the men invaded the usually peaceful island.

When word spread across the 17.5 square mile island that 40-year old Rohan “Anand” Dhanayshure was shot, at least three wedding receptions closed off. Residents came off the streets and locked their doors and windows.

Anand sustained a gunshot wound to his left shoulder and his 21-year old daughter, Lisa, was beaten about her body. “Dem beat she up, she whole skin black and blue, she head too,” said Lisa’s mother.

The girl’s boyfriend was robbed of a gold band during the ordeal that began around 8 PM at Good Success, a short distance from the Wakenaam Ferry Stelling.

One of Dhanaysure’s close neighbours, fearful that the six bandits were on a rampage, hid his children and wife in a ceiling in case they had invaded his home.”I secure them. I put me wife and children in the ceiling,” the man told Demerara Waves Online News (www.demwaves.com) on condition of anonymity.

In another instance, a resident sat on his veranda with his gun in his hand.

An eyewitness said gunshots greeted Dhanaysure as he and another friend arrived on his motorcycle. His friend fled and the businessman fell to the ground. The eyewitness said he and his family were downstairs when one of his children told them that someone was at the back. On looking closer, they saw masked man armed with a gun.

Police said that six men armed with firearms had broken into the home and held up Lisa and her boyfriend and took away an undisclosed quantity of jewellery and cash.

During this time Dhanayshure returned home, was confronted by the men and he was shot. The armed men escaped in a boat, police said in a statement.

Dhanashure owns an ocean-going vessel that transports wood for Barama Company Limited and rice and paddy for farmers on the agriculture-dependent island.