Camille Clarke

Mar­i­jua­na, co­caine and al­co­hol ad­dic­tion led three men in­to a down­ward spi­ral that left them job­less and home­less.Speak­ing at the Min­istry of the Peo­ple and So­cial De­vel­op­ment, St Vin­cent Street, Port-of-Spain, yes­ter­day, three for­mer street dwellers, now re­ha­bil­i­tat­ed, want to stay off the streets.

Dex­ter Cole, a for­mer geri­atric nurse, Bri­an Jack, a for­mer Hous­ing De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion em­ploy­ee, and Shane Par­son are now in the sec­ond phase of re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion at the Pi­paro Em­pow­er­ment Cen­tre (PEC). The cen­tre pro­vides re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion and skills-train­ing for for­mer street dwellers.They said drugs and al­co­hol caused them to aban­don their jobs and live on the streets.Par­son said he was re­unit­ed with his son and sev­er­al fam­i­ly mem­bers but al­co­hol was his life for over 40 years.

"If they put both to­geth­er, I would take the rum and not take my wife. Rum can't give you Aids, it can't horn me, it can't leave me. It can on­ly take me to my grave," he said.Par­son said since then his wife had left and he was com­fort­able liv­ing on the street. The on­ly prob­lem was that he had no shel­ter. He added: "My moth­er died and she cried for me many times but she nev­er lived to see me turn around.

"I used to live in a card­board box. Peo­ple used to pee (uri­nate) on me. I used to go in the riv­er and bathe. I used to wear dirty clothes. Chil­dren didn't want to see me. Many times I had to look for shel­ter when it rained.""Nev­er­the­less," he said, "it was com­fort­able. I would get some­thing to eat or some­body would give me some­thing to eat."

Jack said he aban­doned his job when he start­ed to use co­caine. His ad­vice to oth­ers now is: "Don't take the first pull. He added: "I aban­doned my job be­cause of that thing. This is my first Christ­mas drug-free. I want to get my­self in­to so­ci­ety and live my own life."The co­caine af­fect­ed me tremen­dous­ly. I lost my work at HDC. I was us­ing co­caine while I was three months on the job."

Cole said the ap­proach used by the min­istry's In­ter Agency Unit was more sub­tle than bru­tal tac­tics and the threat to take them off the streets. He said he was phys­i­cal­ly and ver­bal­ly abused when he was younger and did not take his time at school.

"I was hear­ing chil­dren get­ting at­ten­tion at home and that caused me to make an un­time­ly de­ci­sion to take drugs. Pa­tience is a great mas­ter. Don't be hur­ry. I want­ed to grow up quick. Ap­ply pa­tience," he said. Min­is­ter of the Peo­ple and So­cial De­vel­op­ment Dr Glenn Ra­mad­hars­ingh said there were 1,150 street dwellers and 425-460 of them lived in Port-of-Spain.He said when­ev­er a cam­paign was mount­ed to get them off the streets there was usu­al­ly a re­duc­tion of be­tween 30 and 35 per cent in street dwellers.

Yes­ter­day, the min­istry con­tin­ued its ex­er­cise to re­move street dwellers in Port-of-Spain. Some 165 peo­ple have been re­moved from the streets, the min­istry said.