SASCHA WIL­SON

Af­ter a six-mile march to de­liv­er a pe­ti­tion call­ing for the open­ing of the Ra­mai Trace Hin­du School, Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal has warned of more protest ac­tion if their de­mand is not met.

Speak­ing in front of the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion at Sut­ton Street, San Fer­nan­do yes­ter­day.

Mooni­lal had this mes­sage for Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter An­tho­ny Gar­cia. “I want to take the op­por­tu­ni­ty to de­mand from Mr Gar­cia on re­ceipt of that pe­ti­tion that he take ac­tion im­me­di­ate­ly, in­stant­ly and ur­gent­ly to com­plete the Ra­mai Trace Hin­du School. Mr Min­is­ter cease and de­sist of your pol­i­cy of vic­tim­i­sa­tion, of mal­ice, of hate and bring re­lief to the chil­dren of Ra­mai Trace and en­vi­rons.”

Mooni­lal de­liv­ered the pe­ti­tion with over 1,000 names to the school su­per­vi­sor 3 who promised to tran­sit the pe­ti­tion to the min­is­ter.

“We pledge to­day Mr Gar­cia that we will make life ex­treme­ly un­com­fort­able for you if you do not take steps to com­plete the Ra­mai Trace Hin­du School.”

He said the march was just the be­gin­ning of much more protest ac­tion. Over 100 peo­ple, in­clud­ing par­ents, teach­ers, stu­dents, for­mer ed­u­ca­tion min­is­ter Dr Tim Gopeesingh, res­i­dents and oth­er stake­hold­ers, par­tic­i­pat­ed in the three-hour march which be­gan from Ra­mai Trace junc­tion in Debe.

Par­ents and stu­dents have held nu­mer­ous protests, the most re­cent be­ing last month over Gov­ern­ment’s fail­ure to fin­ish and open the school which is 95 per cent com­plete. 

Since 2015 over 200 stu­dents have been housed at the Hanu­man Mi­lan Mandir at Pe­nal Rock Road un­der sub-stan­dard con­di­tions. 

De­scrib­ing the event as a his­toric march for ed­u­ca­tion, Mooni­lal said the min­is­ter promised in 2016, a year af­ter con­struc­tion was halt­ed, to com­plete the school.

“It is re­al­ly a sad day when chil­dren now have to stay away from school to march to en­sure that they get their school, to en­sure that they get their ed­u­ca­tion,” he said.

While the min­is­ter in­di­cat­ed that school is a pri­or­i­ty, he said it is ob­scene that the gov­ern­ment is find­ing $150 mil­lion to re­fur­bish Skin­ner Park, San Fer­nan­do, when a frac­tion of that will com­plete the school. Sher­ryann Per­sad-Bhag­wans­ingh, a par­ent, com­plained that the chil­dren have been suf­fer­ing for years. 

“These chil­dren have been suf­fer­ing for way too long. We are em­bark­ing on a peace­ful march to San Fer­nan­do and we hope and prayer that our pleads are heard.”

She said the tem­ple is not con­ducive to teach­ing and learn­ing.