By Chantalé Fletcher
CHAGUANAS West MP Dinesh Rambally says the response to the plight of Caroni residents in a press release by the Ministry of Works and Transport (MOWT) is nothing short of disingenuous and disgraceful.
He said, “I am pleading with Minister Sinanan and the MOWT to stop making empty promises in respect to obvious priority areas. Residents of Caroni are also taxpaying citizens of Trinidad and Tobago and deserve to be treated fairly.”
In a release on Thursday, Rambally said Wednesday residents of La Paille Village, Caroni, staged a peaceful protest to demand action be taken to fix the embankment along the Caroni River which was in a deteriorated condition and posed serious threats to hundreds of homes and businesses, should a serious flood occur.
He said, “The MOWT blames its failure to repair the embankment on the engineering process, while also admitting they have done absolutely nothing to fix the problem, despite knowing about it for the past five years.
“The residents have not let them forget year after year they have pleaded and begged for assistance for this very problem.”
Rambally added, “Quite shamefully the MOWT also attempts to blame the residents of La Paille Village themselves by saying one resident prevented the MOWT staff from accessing the embankment via his property.
“What the MOWT fails to state is that particular resident was initially afraid of having the structures on his property demolished to facilitate the MOWT’s accessing the riverbank. However, the said resident has since then expressed a willingness to work with the MOWT to facilitate access and has been requesting a meeting with MOWT officials for the past year with no reply.”
Rambally said, “It is clear to me that the MOWT and Minister Rohan Sinanan have no concern that if the Caroni River bursts its bank this rainy season, it will cause a catastrophic flood that will affect all of Caroni and possibly even thousands of persons out of the area.”
He once again reiterated if the ministry does not immediately begin to rectify this issue, drastic measures will be taken to ensure that the voice of the residents of La Paille Village were heard.
Rambally said the ministry indicated that works are expected to commence in one month.
He said, “We will not stand for this mamaguy. On behalf of the people, I am not prepared to accept that very late in the dry season, the Ministry of Works simply parks up a Caterpillar at the subject area, allows the rainy season to start, and then say that no further works can be undertaken.”
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