Camille McEach­nie

Mem­bers of the Crown Point Com­mu­ni­ty Part­ner­ship As­so­ci­a­tion (CC­PA) say the Gov­ern­ment’s di­rec­tive to close bars un­til April 30 to pre­vent the spread of COVID- 19, has forced them to re­trench work­ers.

The Crown Point stretch, the hub of en­ter­tain­ment in To­ba­go, re­mained qui­et since the Gov­ern­ment in­tro­duced the mea­sure.

Over the week­end, many re­mained closed, take-out ser­vice for pa­trons was ful­ly rolled out, but few per­sons vis­it­ed the busi­ness­es.

In a re­lease, mem­bers of the as­so­ci­a­tion said they are in “full sup­port of the gov­ern­ment’s mea­sures.”

How­ev­er, they not­ed: “To com­ply with the gov­ern­ment di­rec­tives, we have, un­for­tu­nate­ly, had to let staff go.”

They said they are pro­vid­ing emo­tion­al sup­port for em­ploy­ees.

They said many “busi­ness­es are wor­ried about their ca­pac­i­ty to re­main vi­able” and are now ap­peal­ing to the gov­ern­ment for fi­nan­cial sup­port in the form of “emer­gency fund­ing and/or spe­cial grants” to help them weath­er the im­pact of the di­rec­tive.

The state­ment added that they are strug­gling fi­nan­cial­ly and have met as a busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty to come up with a sur­vival plan which will in­form the gov­ern­ment of the ex­tent of their fi­nan­cial bur­den.

“We are once again, ap­peal­ing to them (Gov­ern­ment) to put a sup­port and stim­u­lus pack­age in place to as­sist us. We have al­so asked for a meet­ing with the Chief Sec­re­tary to dis­cuss this way for­ward.”

The re­lease added: “...If each of us does the right thing to keep our fam­i­lies, friends, and neigh­bours safe, we will be able to find our way to the oth­er side of this cri­sis.”

Not all mem­bers of the as­so­ci­a­tion have re­trenched staff.

Rene Seep­er­sads­ingh, di­rec­tor of the group of com­pa­nies that man­ages busi­ness­es such as Jade Mon­key Casi­no Bar and Grill, told Guardian Me­dia, over 50 staff mem­bers re­main on the pay­roll.

“We un­der­stand the sit­u­a­tion in the coun­try, so we are play­ing our part. We will fol­low the rules gov­ern­ing in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions,” he said.

He said To­ba­go’s busi­ness­es have faced sev­er­al beat­ings, from the slow­down in the tourism sec­tor, over the years.

“Fi­nal­ly, this year we saw a turn­around, and now this hap­pens.”

On March 20, To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly and Cen­tral Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials met with busi­ness own­ers in To­ba­go.

Of­fi­cials not­ed that in ad­di­tion to the fi­nan­cial mea­sures al­ready in place to as­sist busi­ness­es in the coun­try, To­ba­go’s tourism sec­tor will be giv­en ad­di­tion­al fi­nan­cial sup­port. One mea­sure in­cludes a grant to re­fur­bish prop­er­ties.