Resh­ma Ra­goonath

San Fer­nan­do May­or Kaz­im Ho­sein has launched an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to quar­ry­ing at the base of San Fer­nan­do Hill. He is al­so look­ing in­to links be­tween that ac­tiv­i­ty and huge mounds of grav­el which are be­ing stock­piled in Mara­bel­la.

Ho­sein said he has or­dered the San Fer­nan­do city en­gi­neer to in­ves­ti­gate both ac­tiv­i­ties which are con­nect­ed to con­struc­tion of a three-storey com­mer­cial build­ing at the back of Stack­house Lim­it­ed at the cor­ner of Cir­cu­lar and Pointe-a-Pierre Roads. He said he ex­pects the city en­gi­neer to present his find­ings on Tues­day at a meet­ing of the San Fer­nan­do City Cor­po­ra­tion.

"This is wor­ry­ing to me. Things must be done in ac­cor­dance with the law. Peo­ple must have re­spect for the law," Ho­sein told the Sun­day Guardian. He said the coun­cil will make a de­ci­sion on their next course of ac­tion at Tues­day's meet­ing.The may­or said he was con­cerned about the stock­pil­ing of the ma­te­r­i­al in Mara­bel­la, since it posed a safe­ty risk to mo­torists and was a dust nui­sance for near­by res­i­dents.

"In the heart of Mara­bel­la you are see­ing this tall moun­tain and you have peo­ple wor­ship­ing right there (at a near­by cru­sade)," Ho­sein said.The stock­piles of grav­el, al­most as tall as a two storey build­ing, are lo­cat­ed at the cor­ner of the South­ern Main Road and San Fer­nan­do By-pass.

Yes­ter­day when the Sun­day Guardian vis­it­ed no work was tak­ing place at ei­ther lo­ca­tion. A back­hoe, which was be­ing used for quar­ry­ing at Cir­cu­lar Road was loaded on­to a truck yes­ter­day and re­moved from the site. At Mara­bel­la a mi­ni-ex­ca­va­tor was parked near the mounds of grav­el but no work­ers were in sight.

The May­or or­dered a halt to the quar­ry­ing op­er­a­tions on Thurs­day. Of­fi­cials from the Min­istry of En­er­gy and En­er­gy Af­fairs, to­geth­er with armed po­lice of­fi­cers, vis­it­ed the site af­ter San Fer­nan­do West MP Car­olyn Seep­er­sad-Bachan ex­pressed con­cern about the quar­ry­ing and noise.Ho­sein said pre­lim­i­nary in­ves­ti­ga­tions re­vealed that the land own­er was grant­ed Town and Coun­try ap­proval in 2008 for con­struc­tion of a build­ing but there had been vi­o­la­tions of the con­di­tions of the stip­u­lat­ed no­tice.

He said the ma­te­r­i­al re­moved from the site should have been stock­piled on the par­cel of land at Williamsville "so that no nui­sance is cre­at­ed to the ad­join­ing prop­er­ties or any user of any near­by roads"."Stock­pil­ing of the ma­te­r­i­al is con­firmed to be tak­ing place in Mara­bel­la in the res­i­den­tial area, which rais­es en­vi­ron­men­tal and health is­sues," he said.

On Fri­day, the Min­istry of En­er­gy is­sued a re­lease stat­ing that "no li­cence for min­ing has been grant­ed to any­one or any en­ti­ty for quar­ry­ing at this site or in the vicin­i­ty of the San Fer­nan­do Hill". The min­istry said it is mon­i­tor­ing the sit­u­a­tion.Yes­ter­day Seep­er­sad-Bachan told the Sun­day Guardian she was al­so mon­i­tor­ing the sit­u­a­tion. She said she was un­hap­py about the quar­ry­ing tak­ing place at the base of the San Fer­nan­do Hill since it is a pro­tect­ed land­mark and her­itage site.

She said the quar­ry­ing rais­es a num­ber of ques­tions, in­clud­ing whether the ma­te­r­i­al was be­ing re­moved for the pur­pose of sale, which would be a breach of the law and whether a cer­tifi­cate of en­vi­ron­men­tal clear­ance (CEC) was ap­plied for and ap­proved by the En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA).

San Fer­nan­do Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Daphne Bartlett al­so ex­pressed con­cern about the quar­ry­ing of the hill and the stock­pil­ing of ma­te­r­i­al in Mara­bel­la. She said she has been re­ceiv­ing com­plaints from her mem­bers about the noise, dust and the safe­ty risks from the stock­pil­ing of the grav­el.Bartlett said if the ma­te­r­i­al is il­le­gal the San Fer­nan­do City Cor­po­ra­tion should seize it and use it to back­fill the San Fer­nan­do wa­ter­front.