Rad­hi­ca Sookraj

As the C3 Cen­tre shop­ping and en­ter­tain­ment com­plex ris­es from the ground in Ste Madeleine, hous­es sur­round­ing the com­plex are slow­ly crum­bling.

Res­i­dents of Mer­chis­ton Cas­tle Street, Corinth, on the pe­riph­ery of the $500 mil­lion com­plex say their lives have been in tur­moil since the con­struc­tion project start­ed in 2013.

One res­i­dent, Kam­la Ramkissoon, said a shed be­hind her home has col­lapsed while the walls and con­crete fence around her prop­er­ty have been dam­aged.

Show­ing a rup­tured sew­er line be­hind her home, Ramkissoon said she had a prop­er back­yard be­fore the project was start­ed by the Mack fam­i­ly, founders of JT Al­lum and Com­pa­ny. The com­plex hous­es a su­per JTA Su­per­mar­ket, Movi­eTowne and sev­er­al US-based out­lets, in­clud­ing Chuck E. Cheese's.

"Every day we smell the sew­er. They fixed it and built a wood­en step for us but the en­tire house is crack­ing and we can­not take this any­more," Ramkissoon said. She added that the con­trac­tors agreed to re­store her home for her but that was done ver­bal­ly.

"I asked them to give it to me in black and white. I want an of­fi­cial agree­ment that they will com­pen­sate me but this has nev­er hap­pened and it is un­fair be­cause I can no longer en­joy my home," Ramkissoon added.

She said her son, Mark Ramkissoon, and daugh­ter-in-law, Ayan­na Jack­son, who gave birth to a ba­by girl over the week­end, has to va­cate the house.

"The place is dusty and it is not safe for the ba­by. Why should we have to leave our home," Ramkissoon added.

She al­so said an­oth­er son. Joel Ramkissoon, and his wife, Mechelle Khan, have been rent­ing in Princes Town. Joel said he was not com­fort­able with liv­ing near the con­struc­tion site.

"Dur­ing the day the house rocks. All the lou­vre panes have fall­en off and any time now the house could fall. We just can­not stay in here," Joel added.

"They put steel in my land and every­where there is dust. It is dan­ger­ous liv­ing so close to a con­struc­tion zone and even though en­gi­neers have come and viewed the dam­age, no­body is help­ing us," he added.

The res­i­dents said they planned to go to San Fer­nan­do may­or Kaz­im Ho­sein to get as­sis­tance.

Com­pa­ny re­sponds

?Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, C3's prop­er­ty man­ag­er, Ter­rence Ram­samooj, as­sured that all af­fect­ed res­i­dents would be prop­er­ly com­pen­sat­ed once ev­i­dence of dam­age was seen.

He said at the start of con­struc­tion JTA con­sul­tants did in­ves­ti­ga­tions and took pho­tographs of sur­round­ing prop­er­ties.

"We have in­formed the res­i­dents that if they have dam­age to their prop­er­ties it will be han­dled by our bro­kers, Ib­wil. If they have es­ti­mates, they could for­ward it to us and we will have the in­sur­ance do their in­ves­ti­ga­tions, re­port­ing and as­sess­ment and they will be com­pen­sat­ed," Ram­samooj said.

Say­ing JTA want­ed to main­tain a good re­la­tion­ship with the res­i­dents, Ram­samooj said once the project was com­plet­ed, all claims would be ad­dressed.