KE­JAN HAYNES

Lead Ed­i­tor - News­gath­er­ing

ke­jan.haynes@guardian.co.tt

The Com­mis­sion of En­quiry in­to the Paria Div­ing Tragedy will con­vene a vir­tu­al sit­ting on Wednes­day No­vem­ber 29, at 2 pm.

The Com­mis­sion said yes­ter­day this will be its fi­nal sit­ting and it is not ex­pect­ed to last more than one hour. A source close to the com­mis­sion con­firmed the chair­man is on track to de­liv­er the re­port by his No­vem­ber 30 dead­line.

The source sought to al­lay any con­cerns this sit­ting was ex­pect­ed to be a re­quest for or an an­nounce­ment of an­oth­er de­lay.

Chair­man Jerome Lynch, KC, has asked for sev­er­al ex­ten­sions be­fore sub­mit­ting the fi­nal re­port. Its orig­i­nal dead­line of East­er was pushed back to Au­gust, then No­vem­ber. Lynch had said he was en­sur­ing all par­ties named in the re­port were giv­en the op­por­tu­ni­ty to see how they were re­flect­ed and then al­lowed to re­spond.

The Com­mis­sion’s sec­re­tari­at not­ed in a re­lease coun­sel are not re­quired to at­tend, but may choose to do so if they wish.

Mem­bers of the pub­lic who wish to at­tend are asked to con­tact the Com­mis­sion’s sec­re­tari­at on or be­fore 4 pm on Mon­day, No­vem­ber 27.

Michael Kur­ban, the son of Fyzal Kur­ban, said yes­ter­day he would be tun­ing in. He said he’s es­pe­cial­ly ready to hear what is in the re­port.

“I would like to hear what he has to say. From there we know what’s go­ing on,” he said.

Lar­ry Boodram, broth­er of sole sur­vivor Christo­pher Boodram, said his fam­i­ly will al­so be watch­ing the hear­ing on tele­vi­sion.

“In terms of what I want him (Chair­man Lynch) to say, noth­ing re­al­ly. I just hope that the truth comes out,” he told Guardian Me­dia. “I hope they process it un­bi­as­ed­ly, that’s all I need to know.”

When asked how his broth­er was hold­ing up, he said, “Every time the top­ic of the com­mis­sion comes up, emo­tions and mem­o­ries come up. Emo­tions of un­just ac­tions that oc­curred. He’s try­ing his best to deal with it and we’re try­ing our best to sup­port him,” the broth­er said.

Vanes­sa Kussie, wife of Rishi Na­gas­sar and new­ly elect­ed Cou­va West/Roys­to­nia coun­cil­lor, said she would def­i­nite­ly be view­ing the pro­ceed­ings. She said she had a lot of thoughts on the whole com­mis­sion but want­ed some time to process them all be­fore mak­ing a state­ment.