Rachael Es­pinet

What stared as a march against the de­vel­op­ment of land by farm­ers in the Ch­aguara­mas area, yes­ter­day cas­cad­ed in­to a fo­rum where some cit­i­zens could air their griev­ances about the state of the coun­try's af­fairs.

Ap­prox­i­mate­ly 200 peo­ple marched from the Ch­aguara­mas Ho­tel and Con­ven­tion Cen­tre to Par­lia­ment at the In­ter­na­tion­al Wa­ter­front Cen­tre, Port-of-Spain, to air their con­cerns over the land mat­ter and oth­er is­sues.

A few marched for what they be­lieved was their land. A few marched for the preser­va­tion of what they be­lieved was a his­tor­i­cal land mark. A few marched for equal ac­cess for all. And some marched against the Gov­ern­ment.

"This morn­ing is a very im­por­tant morn­ing and day in the his­to­ry of the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go. In 1960 there was the march for Ch­aguara­mas and that was a strug­gle led by Dr (Er­ic) Williams to re­claim this piece of land for the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

"To­day, more than 60 years lat­er, the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go have to fight to re­claim once again what is ours," said David Ab­du­lah, leader of the Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice.

Yes­ter­day's march stemmed from an on­go­ing row be­tween farm­ers of the Ch­aguara­mas area and the Ch­aguara­mas De­vel­op­ment Au­thor­i­ty.

Farm­ers have ex­pressed their griev­ances about be­ing dis­placed from land they cul­ti­vat­ed for many years.

How­ev­er, oth­er is­sues like the de­vel­op­ment of Ch­aguara­mas, the pos­si­ble de­struc­tion of the con­ven­tion cen­tre and full ac­cess to the Ch­aguara­mas area were among the grous­es pro­test­ers had yes­ter­day.

The pro­test­ers ex­pressed con­cerns that the Gov­ern­ment had sold nu­mer­ous ac­ers of land in Ch­aguara­mas to pri­vate own­ers.

Ab­du­lah claimed there was gov­ern­men­tal in­ter­fer­ence and nepo­tism with the busi­ness mat­ters of Ch­aguara­mas.

Too much his­to­ry

Like the pro­test­ers, Ab­du­lah said the con­ven­tion cen­tre should not be torn down be­cause it is a valu­able part of Caribbean his­to­ry.

"Big busi­ness peo­ple get­ting this Con­ven­tion Cen­tre where the Treaty of Ch­aguara­mas was signed, bring­ing in­to ex­is­tence Cari­com, and the re­vised treaty of Cari­com was al­so signed here, bring­ing in­to be­ing the Caribbean Sin­gle Mar­ket and Econ­o­my.

"This lo­ca­tion has his­to­ry not on­ly for the peo­ple of Care­nage, not on­ly for peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go, but for the en­tire re­gion, the en­tire Caribbean," Ab­du­lah said.

Mem­bers of the In­de­pen­dent Lib­er­al Par­ty (ILP), Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice (MSJ) and cit­i­zens from around the coun­try al­so gath­ered to march in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the res­i­dents from Ch­aguara­mas.

"This is not a po­lit­i­cal march. It is not even a march for the trade unions, or job se­cu­ri­ty. This is a march to pre­serve the his­to­ry of the coun­try. This is a march for fight for the in­equal­i­ty that is tak­ing place in the coun­try," ILP leader Jack Warn­er said.

Many se­nior cit­i­zens, some of whom marched with Dr Williams in the 60s, marched from Care­nage to Port-of-Spain.

David Wil­son, a 63-year-old man from El Do­ra­do, Tu­na­puna, made the en­tire walk from Ch­aguara­mas to Port-of-Spain on crutch­es. Wil­son said the crutch­es was for a three-year-old leg in­jury, but he had to make the march be­cause he was not hap­py with what was go­ing on in the coun­try.

CDA on­ly leas­ing

In re­sponse to the protest, CDA CEO Joycelin Har­g­reaves told the T&T Guardian that ac­cord­ing to the Ch­aguara­mas De­vel­op­ment Au­thor­i­ty Act the land can­not be sold. How­ev­er, it can be leased for up to 30 years.

Har­g­reaves al­so con­firmed that the CDA planned to turn the Con­ven­tion Cen­tre in­to a four-star ho­tel. As such, she said there will be a lot of work done on it and there was no guar­an­tee the orig­i­nal build­ings will be pre­served.

She added that the CDA has been in the process of leas­ing out land to in­vestors, but said she could not spec­i­fy due to le­gal rea­sons.

Re­spond­ing to the farm­ers' com­plaints, Har­g­reaves said ac­cord­ing to the CDA Act, land in Ch­aguara­mas can be leased, and if the farm­ers have proof that they have a lease they should bring it for­ward.

Hop­ing to as­suage the fears of the pro­test­ers, Har­g­reaves said the CDA's goal is to pro­vide an open and ac­ces­si­ble area that will be en­joyed by all.