Yvonne Webb

As teach­ers at the Basse Terre RC School, Moru­ga, re­fused to work in in­ad­e­quate con­di­tions yes­ter­day, their union urged them to ex­er­cise self-preser­va­tion and the safe­ty of stu­dents in their care.The T&T Uni­fied Teach­ers' As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) first vice-pres­i­dent Lyns­ley Doo­d­hai re­mind­ed prin­ci­pals that un­der the Ed­u­ca­tion Act they were re­spon­si­ble for the teach­ers and stu­dents un­der their care.

He cau­tioned that if they dis­re­gard­ed that and al­lowed their charges to op­er­ate in build­ings that were not fit for oc­cu­pa­tion, then they could be charged with neg­li­gence.Doo­d­hai's state­ments came as he de­nounced what he saw as at­tempts of in­tim­i­da­tion by the Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion Dr Tim Gopeesingh against its su­per­vi­sors and prin­ci­pals to have all schools re­main open in the face of in­fra­struc­tur­al prob­lems.

Doo­d­hai said TTUTA had in­for­ma­tion that the min­is­ter had called su­per­vi­sors and prin­ci­pals to meet­ings twice dur­ing the Christ­mas hol­i­days and had giv­en them a man­date."We un­der­stand he in­ti­mat­ed to them that if any school failed to open, they will be held per­son­al­ly re­spon­si­ble. That is why many schools opened and closed af­ter just a half-an-hour to an hour on Mon­day," he added.

Doo­d­hai said for a long time promis­es made by the Ed­u­ca­tion Fa­cil­i­ties Com­pa­ny Ltd (EF­CL) to con­duct re­pair work at the Moru­ga school had been bro­ken. He said the frus­trat­ed school's PTA raised over $2,000 for re­pairs but that was not enough.He re­mind­ed prin­ci­pals of their re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and told them to do all in their pow­er to en­sure their per­son­al health and safe­ty and that of their teach­ers and stu­dents.

Min­istry: We held talks

The min­istry's me­dia re­la­tions co-or­di­na­tor, Yolan­da Morales-Car­val­ho, de­fend­ed the min­is­ter, say­ing when­ev­er schools have prob­lems, what­ev­er de­ci­sion was tak­en, was done af­ter con­sul­ta­tion with stake­hold­ers.She said the ear­ly dis­missals on Mon­day at North Man­zanil­la and Low­er Cu­mu­to Gov­ern­ment were the re­sult of heavy rain over the week­end.

At Low­er Cu­mu­to, she said, the down­pour in­un­dat­ed the sew­er sys­tem at the old school build­ing, mak­ing it un­fit for use. She said the new build­ing would be ready with­in the next month and in the in­ter­im class­es would be held in the old build­ing while sew­er-sys­tem work was be­ing un­der­tak­en.She said rain al­so wreaked hav­oc at the North Man­zanil­la school, caus­ing some hic­cups with a leak­ing roof but could not say when that is­sue would be re­solved.

Morales-Car­val­ho al­so said the EF­CL, which was do­ing re­pair work on be­half of the min­istry, al­so vis­it­ed the El­swick Pres­by­ter­ian School yes­ter­day to have the sew­er sys­tem pumped out.But, she said, there ap­peared to be some oth­er prob­lems at that school and an­oth­er meet­ing was sched­uled for to­day with rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the min­istry, EF­CL, the PTA and the prin­ci­pal to as­cer­tain ex­act­ly what need­ed to be done.

She said Basse Terre RC School, Moru­ga, re­mained open but had no in­for­ma­tion that teach­ers were re­fus­ing to work be­cause of in­fra­struc­tur­al prob­lems.