RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Dozens of chil­dren in Debe re­ceived free book bags and sta­tionery yes­ter­day as part of an ini­tia­tive to help fam­i­lies pre­pare for the new school term.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia, Chan­droutie Son­ny­boy said she wel­comed the as­sis­tance for her grand­son, say­ing the cost of school sup­plies has in­creased sig­nif­i­cant­ly, with some book bags now cost­ing more than $500.

An­oth­er par­ent said the cost of books and sta­tionery was high.

“It’s been chal­leng­ing for me, food-wise, on the whole is ex­pen­sive, and things for him are very ex­pen­sive, and I am glad that I am get­ting some help,” she added.

Speak­ing to the con­stituents, En­er­gy Min­is­ter and Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal said the dis­tri­b­u­tion marked the start of a pro­gramme to as­sist chil­dren across the con­stituen­cy with school sup­plies and vouch­ers.

“This is re­al­ly the launch, the be­gin­ning of a pro­gramme to as­sist the chil­dren of our con­stituen­cy with their re­turn-to-school sup­plies, book bags and, of course, some help, some vouch­ers and so on to help you so that you can pur­chase nec­es­sary and es­sen­tial sup­plies,” Dr Mooni­lal said.

He said sev­er­al sim­i­lar ac­tiv­i­ties would be held across the con­stituen­cy.

Dr Mooni­lal al­so high­light­ed the aca­d­e­m­ic achieve­ments of stu­dents in the area, par­tic­u­lar­ly a stu­dent of Debe Hin­du School who was among three stu­dents who topped the coun­try in the re­cent ex­am­i­na­tions.

He con­grat­u­lat­ed the stu­dent, prin­ci­pal Usha Ram­per­sad and the school’s teach­ers, say­ing Debe had be­come a cen­tre of ed­u­ca­tion­al achieve­ment.

The min­is­ter al­so told par­ents and stu­dents that work was con­tin­u­ing on the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies South Cam­pus at Debe.

He said Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion Dr Michael Dowlath and Min­is­ter of Le­gal and Land Af­fairs Sad­dam Ho­sein were work­ing to en­sure the cam­pus opens soon.

Dr Mooni­lal said the cam­pus would cre­ate op­por­tu­ni­ties for young peo­ple, busi­ness­es and com­mu­ni­ties in Pe­nal-Debe, south Trinidad and across the Caribbean.

He al­so re­mind­ed stu­dents en­ter­ing sec­ondary school that the Gov­ern­ment had promised to pro­vide lap­tops.

“Ed­u­ca­tion is a pri­or­i­ty for this Gov­ern­ment,” Mooni­lal said, con­vey­ing Dr Dowlath’s best wish­es to the chil­dren for a pro­duc­tive and suc­cess­ful school year.