JUST under three weeks ago, the life of pretty and petite Kenisha Baird was snuffed out during an encounter with three of her peers on a public roadway in Mocha, an East Bank Demerara village. From reports garnered by operatives in the media, Kenisha was almost a typical teenager bubbling over with the joy of life. We say almost because after her death, Kenisha’s mother told reporters that her daughter had a heart problem for which she was under doctor’s care. In spite of this ailment, the teenager lived a fairly normal life. She loved dressing up and wearing make-up, and she delighted in participating in social events. Kenisha was the reigning Miss Mocha. During her last hours on earth, Kenisha reportedly joined other young ladies in rehearsals for the upcoming Miss East Bank Talented Teen contest, before visiting her seamstress to see about the finishing touches to her evening gown for the glamorous stage show. According to her immediate relatives and some of her friends, Kenisha was in a bubble of high spirits. She seemed confident that she would do well in the contest, an event that arguably, could have placed her in the national spotlight with all the promise such recognition could entail.
But the promise of recognition and the dream of further stage success were to be shattered when she was brutally beaten and choked to death sometime after 21:00 hrs that day. The eyewitness accounts were chilling. While two teenagers were scuffling with Kenisha, another girl reportedly attacked the village queen from behind by grabbing her throat with both hands. Within moments, a crowd had formed a ring around the combatants and was lustily cheering them on as they delivered further punishment to the victim. Worst of all, when some public-spirited villagers attempted to separate Kenisha and her attackers, others resisted these efforts. “Leh deh fight! Leh deh fight!” was the rallying cry of the persons forming the ring. At the end of the fracas, Kenisha’s still body slumped to the ground and her attackers fled. The young woman was rushed to the Georgetown Hospital, where she was pronounced dead by medical personnel.
Kenisha’s mother, Ms Annette Wharton, proffered a theory for her daughter’s cruel demise. “Apparently, they didn’t want her to take part in the pageant (the Miss East Bank Talented Queen contest) because they know she is a strong contender. That is the problem they had with her.” It was an explanation all the more frightening for its simplicity and fatalistic logic.
Other villagers spoke of a short-lived feud between Kenisha and her attackers. Perhaps the real cause of the encounter in which this young woman’s life was snuffed out of her body would never be fully known. But the tragic and wanton method of her death would continue to baffle the minds of those who view human life as sacred and who believe that children and young people should be nurtured in environments that would promote the healthy development of their bodies, as well as their intellectual and artistic abilities.
In brooding over the manner of Kenisha’s death, one senior journalist wondered aloud about the kind of contemporary village culture that would permit and promote such violence and human destruction. He remembers the village life of a generation ago, when concerns for safety extended well beyond biological ties and every child had to address adult villagers as “Uncle” or “Auntie”. No child or teenager in those times would dream of being disrespectful to an adult whether that person be a relative, a family friend or a perfect stranger. But, more puzzling than the seeming loss of a nurturing village culture, is the animus that drove teenage girls to perpetrate such a savage and lethal attack on a peer. Is this, perhaps, yet another manifestation of the mindless sense of competition that obtains in some aspects of American culture? It is the intensity of competition that drives a young person to eliminate his or her rival whether it be a game or a beauty contest?
The Guyanese public has probably stopped wondering about this tragic story and is busily ingesting the latest aberration in human behaviour. But all those who knew and loved Kenisha Baird are undoubtedly still mourning her passing while silently asking the heavens, why did she have to die.