Human Services Director Elizabeth Lewis
The Human Service Department is currently making plans to assist communities and individuals to better resolve conflicts, amid an upsurge in chopping incidents, which have led to some fatalities, most recently.
Director of Human Services Elizabeth Lewis told St. Lucia News Online (SNO) on Monday (Jan.25) that her Department is looking at ways in which they could help to address this issue.
Lewis said her Department is concerned about this recent development where persons are starting to attack each other with the use of sharp objects to resolve their conflicts.
“It is a matter of concern for us and we want to remind persons out there that that is certainly not the way to solve issues,” the human services department head stated.
She continued: “We live in a very civilized society and as a developing nation, we need to find a way to move on from this barbaric society and find other ways to address our issues.”
Lewis told SNO that her Department plans to educate persons of better ways to resolve their problems, particularly through hosting conflict resolution workshops.
While these plans have not been finalized, she said her team is actively engaged in discussions in relation to this and is looking at different target communities, despite the issue seems to be widespread.
“Conflicts are part of life. There will be conflicts. How we resolve them, however, is very important. We have to be more careful in our response and we should not seek to harm or hurt people in that way.”
Lewis said Saint Lucia witnessed a high number of gun violence last year, but this seem to have eased and now persons are faced with this new phenomenon.
She reminded that her Department has an open door policy and everyone is welcomed to seek assistance.
“Persons can feel free to come to use our office to discuss family related issues and we will see how best we can assist them. We may not be able to resolve them directly, but we would refer them to the correct agency,” she said.
On Sunday, a Corinth man was brutally attacked by an unknown individual. The victim was brutally chopped in the head and arm, and lost a finger as a result of this incident.
Four days before that a man was attacked by four men in Soufriere. He was brutally chopped in the head and remains in a critical condition at hospital. Three suspects are being questioned.
On January 10, an 18-year-old man male was chopped in Ravine Poisson.
There have been a series of other similar incidents.
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