A Nigg, Corentyne, Berbice, family of six believes they were deliberately targeted after a firebomb was allegedly thrown at their home and vehicles in the early hours of Tuesday.
Contractor Rawjhen Armogan, 54, of Lot 242 Plantation Nigg, said he and his wife were asleep in the lower flat of their two-storey home at about 2am when they were startled by what initially sounded like a gunshot.
Armogan said he soon realised something had struck the wall of the house, and when he looked outside, he saw flames.
“I thought it was a gunshot, and it was a splash straight into the wall, but when I get up from my bed and I pull the blind and I see fire at the outside, but I thought it was something, you know, catch outside, I didn’t expect that, what I think, so I burst the door and run out, when I see fire all over the place,” Armogan recounted.
Armogan said the alleged attack appeared to be directed at the house and his family. He explained that he and his son, son-in-law and other family members immediately began battling the flames with a hose while the Fire Service was contacted.
“But when I see the wick then tell my wife that somebody is, it’s somebody targeting us and targeting my family, and we have all our truck at the outside of the yard, but they actually come for my family and the house, you know, if we burn, they get burn everything with my family inside,” he said. “Well, I saw fire right at the front there, I saw fire on the gutters, like you could see where it’s burned out, I saw the truck is on fire, yeah, and one straight in front of my gate, there’s a vehicle parked straight in front of the gate, yep, all was fire,” he related.
By the time firefighters arrived, the family had managed to extinguish most of the blaze.
Armogan said a bottle believed to have been used in the incident was recovered, along with a container containing kerosene.
He said security footage from the property appears to show a male figure approaching from the direction of the dam and moving alongside one of the trucks before throwing a lit bottle towards the property.
“Six bottles, it’s a Eldorado 5 years bottle with a wick on it, and there’s a container that right in front of the truck at the yard, in front, out there, there was a container that contain kero yeah, a bottle that, yeah, what they lit the wick with…We see a person, it’s a male person, but the person has a hoodie, so we can’t know it’s who,” he said.
“We don’t have no conflict with nobody,” he said.
The contractor said the incident has left him concerned about the safety of his family and has forced him to consider putting additional security measures in place.
“I will protect my family with my life, brother. If I have to die, I will die,” Armogan said, adding that his faith remains in God.
He said he is hoping that the matter will be properly investigated and that the family will receive justice.
The father of a household of six said the incident has left the family shaken, particularly because it occurred while the children were upstairs asleep.
Police investigations are ongoing.
