Com­mu­ni­ty ac­tivist Garth Christo­pher, who re­ceived a month's no­tice to va­cate the North West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty's (NWRHA) premis­es on Dos San­tos Street, Mor­vant, was on the sixth day of his hunger strike yes­ter­day.

The lease to the premis­es ex­pires to­day. When he was giv­en the let­ter of evic­tion by head of the NWRHA, Act­ing CEO An­tho­ny J Moore, Christo­pher said no rea­son was giv­en for the move.

Christo­pher said the fa­cil­i­ty, which they use as a com­mu­ni­ty cen­tre, pro­vides a safe heav­en for all stu­dents in the area. He said Mal­ick Sec­ondary School stu­dents al­so use the fa­cil­i­ties, which sup­ports stu­dents in­volved in the arts and IT.

Christo­pher, the founder and pres­i­dent of Lem­ra (Laven­tille East Mor­vant Res­i­dents As­so­ci­a­tion), which op­er­ates the Com­mu­ni­ty Im­pact Com­plex at Dos San­tos Street, said “I am on this hunger strike be­cause I re­fused to sup­port state-spon­sored child aban­don­ment which is be­ing pro­mot­ed and pur­sued by the Gov­ern­ment.

“I am be­ing per­se­cut­ed be­cause I am per­ceived as a UNC ac­tivist, which I'm not, and they want to see all the worth and val­ue we're do­ing in the com­mu­ni­ty be de­stroyed and I am from Mon Re­pos Road, Mor­vant.

“The PNM has been do­ing noth­ing for us for decades and it's a PNM strong­hold and we de­cid­ed as res­i­dents that this is too im­por­tant to be left up to un­car­ing politi­cians. “

He said the for­mer gov­ern­ment had start­ed con­struc­tion of a Mor­vant Cen­tral Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre on Cipri­ani Street, but work had stopped on the project. Christo­pher said he was go­ing to see his lawyer for him to in­ter­vene in the mat­ter.

MP: They have good pro­grammes

Adri­an Leonce, MP for Laven­tille East/Mor­vant, said he had spo­ken to Christo­pher.

He said his main con­cern was that the fa­cil­i­ties had a num­ber of good pro­grammes, he want­ed to en­sure that they con­tin­ued and that it does not im­pact neg­a­tive­ly on res­i­dents.

When Leonce was asked if the res­i­dents could use the St Fran­cois Val­ley Road and Ro­main Lands Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre, for­mer­ly Misir Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre, which was just a five min­utes dri­ve fur­ther up the road, he said some­times spe­cif­ic lo­ca­tions would be more con­ve­nient.