Despite an order from the Tunapuna/Piarco Regional Corporation to stop work until it has approvals, work on the sporting complex at the Tacarigua Savannah continued yesterday.Peter Burke, chair of the Save Our Green Space committee, said the company was breaking the law.He and his group staged a placard protest outside the Sports Company of T&T (Sportt), Henry Street, Port-of-Spain, yesterday. Sportt is the state-owned company which is managing the project on behalf of the Government.
Burke led some 22 residents and members of the group in a lunchtime protest seeking public support to stop the project.He referred to a November 23 stop order, issued by the Tunapuna/Piarco Regional Corporation and claimed that the Sportt company, through the contractors, Synthesis Group Ltd, had refused to adhere to it."They are now breaking the law...They are violating a stop order as issued by the Tunapuna/Piarco Corporation," Burke said.
Burke said a state company was not exempt from the law and if a structure was illegally erected then it could be taken down. "The fact that the Sports Company is blatantly flouting the law and the stop order is a source of very serious concern, particularly when they proceeded with fencing around that place without any approval whatever. So even if the approvals came now, they had that project started before the approvals came."
He also said the group wrote to acting Commissioner of Police Stephen Williams yesterday asking him to instruct his officers to maintain the peace and ensure that the law was followed, since police were "protecting a state authority in breach of the law."Burke described the events as "disturbing."The group is planning another protest today at the Tacarigua savannah.
Chairman of the Tunapuna/Piarco corporation, Edwin Gooding said on November 26 that the corporation had no plans to stop the sporting centre at Orange Grove but rather its role was to ensure that proper procedure was being followed before the project started. –with reporting by Melissa Doughty