Sascha?Wil­son

A spi­der­man tow­el, a cap and his favourite toy are among the things which will be placed in the cas­ket of 13-year-old Ny­ron Ram­cha­ran to­day at his Rochard Road, Pe­nal home.

A song that he and his par­ents–Nan­da, 36, and Ma­hadeo Ram­cha­ran, 47–loved will al­so be played dur­ing their fu­ner­al ser­vice un­der Hin­du rites.

All three were killed in an ac­ci­dent on Tues­day.

Nan­da's el­der sis­ter Mar­i­lyn Sun­dar-Ram­per­sad said the moth­er and son would ar­rive in one hearse while Ma­hadeo in an­oth­er, but all the cas­kets would be placed side by side.

Ny­ron and his par­ents will then be cre­mat­ed in one pyre at the Shore of Peace at Mos­qui­to Creek.

The tragedy touched the hearts of many, in­clud­ing Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar who vis­it­ed Ny­ron's two sib­lings Rikash, 17, and Nigel, 12, and oth­er rel­a­tives at their Ramsabad Trace home on Thurs­day evening.

Pledg­ing her gov­ern­ment's sup­port to the fam­i­ly, Per­sad-Bisses­sar held the chil­dren's hands as she tried to com­fort them.

She said: "I am not hap­py to be here..I would have been hap­py if I came for some­thing oth­er than why I am here this evening. So I do not share your hap­pi­nesss min­is­ter, that my pres­ence here came about be­cause of the tragedy for his fam­i­ly."

She was re­fer­ring to Moru­ga/Table­land MP Clifton De Coteau who, in his wel­com­ing re­marks, ex­pressed hap­pi­ness for the vis­it.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said her pur­pose of her vis­it was to share in the fam­i­ly's grief, but at a time like this there is lit­tle words of com­fort I can share."

The Prime Min­is­ter asked fam­i­ly and friends to give all their sup­port to the sur­viv­ing chil­dren. "We will do all we can to help them. I know my of­fice has al­ready been in touch with them and they have been mak­ing cer­tain arrange­ments...but all of us will now have to close and bond to­geth­er to give these two main chil­dren all the sup­port."

Say­ing the chil­dren were blessed since they had a big fam­i­ly, she urged rel­a­tives to guide the chil­dren in the right way.

She al­so en­cour­aged the chil­dren to move for­ward, study hard and ho­n­our their par­ents.

"Your par­ents will want you to grow and be strong and do well and if you are to ho­n­our your par­ents and show your love for them, be­cause they will know, then you are to con­tin­ue to be strong and work hard and do well. You have to con­tin­ue for the sake of your par­ents be­cause you are all that they have left here."

Ex­press­ing thanks for Per­sad-Bisses­sar, her gov­ern­ment and all the oth­er sup­port they have re­ceived were Sun­dar-Ram­per­sad, one of Nan­da's six sur­viv­ing sis­ters and Har­richa­ran Cassie, state coun­sel with the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion. Cassie said their pain will nev­er be erased.

De­scrib­ing Ny­ron as an an­gel loved by all and his par­ents as lov­ing peo­ple, Sun­dar-Ram­per­sad said they would nev­er be re­placed.

Be­fore leav­ing, the Prime Min­is­ter spent a few min­utes speak­ing pri­vate­ly with Rikash, Nigel, their grand­moth­er Bernadette Sun­dar and oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers.

...promis­es bet­ter safe­ty mea­sures on high­ways

Ten­ders have gone out for bar­ri­er ca­ble in­stal­la­tion project along the na­tion's high­ways, said Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

She was re­spond­ing to con­cerns by Ar­rive Alive pres­i­dent Sharon In­gle­field who ques­tioned whether enough was be­ing done to pre­vent cross-over col­li­sions.

On Tues­day Ma­hadeo Ram­cha­ran, 48, his wife, Nan­da, 36, and their 13-year-old son, Ny­ron, were killed along the Uri­ah But­ler High­way, near En­deav­or Fly­over, Ch­agua­nas.

A garbage truck spun out of con­trol, af­ter be­ing hit by a white Lancer, crossed the me­di­an and land­ed on top the fam­i­ly's car, crush­ing them. The dri­ver of the lancer was de­tained by po­lice, but has since been re­leased pend­ing fur­ther in­quires.

Ques­tioned by the me­dia dur­ing her vis­it to be­reaved rel­a­tives at Ramsabad Trace, Rochard Road, Pe­nal on Thurs­day evening, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the ques­tion about the bar­ri­er's in­stal­la­tion pro­gramme was posed to Works and In­fra­struc­ture Min­is­ter Dr Su­ru­jrat­tan Ram­bachan in Par­lia­ment.

"The min­is­ter said there were three ten­ders at the mo­ment so that is in train for fur­ther work with re­spect to the bar­ri­ers." Asked how long it would take, "I would ask you to speak to Min­is­ter Su­ru­jrat­tan be­cause that is his line min­istry but we did ask him to­day."

With re­gards to the speed guns for the po­lice, she said the law was on­ly passed a few days ago and it has to go to Pres­i­dent An­tho­ny Car­mona to sign off. "There­after we will work on it very swift­ly."

Com­ment­ing on the re­lease of the dri­ver of the white Lancer, Nan­da's sis­ter Mar­i­lyn Sun­dar-Ram­per­sad said the fam­i­ly was not blam­ing any­one.

She said their fo­cus was on to­day's fu­ner­al ser­vice at the house of mourn­ing and there­after the well-be­ing of the two sur­viv­ing chil­dren, Rikash, 17, and Nigel, 12.

"So right at this point we are not ac­cus­ing any­one. We are not point­ing fin­gers at any­one. We just have to deal with one thing at a time," the Prime Min­is­ter said.

She thanked BK Hold­ings, the own­er of the garbage truck in the ac­ci­dent, for their sup­port.

She said the Pe­nal Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion had al­so or­gan­ised a po­lice es­cort from the house to the Shore of Peace, Mos­qui­to Creek, South Oropouche where the par­ents and their son will be cre­mat­ed on a sin­gle pyre.

Ma­hadeo Ram­cha­ran, em­ployed as a med­ical or­der­ly su­per­vi­sor at the South West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty, and was re­turn­ing home with his wife and son af­ter tak­ing his son for dial­y­sis treat­ment at the Mt Hope Hos­pi­tal.

Four years ago Ny­ron's moth­er had saved his life af­ter giv­ing him one of her kid­neys. (SW)