SHAS­TRI BOODAN

Cou­va North MP Ra­mona Ram­di­al has as­sured res­i­dents there will be more po­lice pa­trols in the area. She spoke with the Sun­day Guardian yes­ter­day about the botched kid­nap­ping of four-year-old Suri Sookdeo of Wa­ter­loo Road, Cara­pichaima on Fri­day. The child was res­cued by vil­lagers af­ter a man snatched her while she was be­ing dropped off at a pre-school at Bhag­wan­deen Street by a fe­male rel­a­tive. The man was lat­er ar­rest­ed by the po­lice.

Ram­di­al said she has spo­ken with Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Dwyane Gibbs who has as­sured there would be in­creased pa­trols in the area. Ram­di­al said she was giv­ing the 21 cen­tu­ry po­lice ini­tia­tive a chance to work and was ap­peal­ing to com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers to be vig­i­lant and keep an eye out for crime. Ram­di­al said the Cou­va/Tabaquite/Tal­paro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion has ac­quired brush cut­ters that would be used to clear over­grown grounds.

Or­lan­do Nages­sar, the Ch­agua­nas may­or and chair­man of the Cou­va North UNC Con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive, blamed the Es­tate Man­age­ment Busi­ness De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny Ltd for not main­tain­ing the aban­doned sug­ar es­tates in T&T. Nages­sar said the aban­doned es­tates at Joyce Roads, Pe­ters Field, Roops­ingh Road and Fac­to­ry Road have now be­come dump­ing grounds, hide-outs for crim­i­nals and a place where peo­ple scrap stolen cars.