The City of Port-of-Spain has never been the same since the July 27, 1990 uprising 21 years ago. This statement came yesterday from Gregory Aboud, president of the Downtown Owners and Merchants' Association (DOMA), a witness before the Commission of Enquiry into the attempted toppling of the Government by Jamaat al Muslimeen insurgents. Aboud told the commission how Port-of-Spain changed, physically and demographically, since it was burnt and looted for as many as five days after the insurrection.
He said business people rebuilt properties in a fortress-like manner, unlike the Port-of-Spain of old which had more glass shop fronts and more levels above ground. Glass shop fronts virtually disappeared and the new stores were built like concrete boxes with concrete roofs and very few windows, Aboud said. He said habitations above the ground level, which housed lawyers, accountants and other professionals and businesses, also disappeared after 1990. "There are mostly ground level shops with little above," the Port-of-Spain businessman said.
Losses sustained after the burning and looting of Port-of-Spain were estimated at between $200 and $300 million and dozens of the smaller businesses never returned to the city or anywhere else, he said. Giving an unrecorded example of how "ordinary" lives were affected by the coup d'etat, Aboud said one Charlotte Street businesswoman lost her car and her house because she was unable to meet the mortgage when her business was destroyed. "It was quite a travesty. So much havoc was wreaked on so many people," Aboud said, admitting that the event left him and others cynical and disdainful about life in T&T in general.
"The event passed through the history books without consequence. No one was charged with murder. Persons were freed. No one paid for losses. "It was why I came to give evidence here. It was not so much the non-payment of insurance for destroyed businesses".