RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Amid grow­ing con­cerns from Ce­dros res­i­dents about the state of se­cu­ri­ty along the south­west­ern penin­su­la, Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Roger Alexan­der has as­sured that ad­di­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures have been im­ple­ment­ed in the area.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, Alexan­der said Wayne Sturge has been placed in charge of ex­ter­nal bor­der pa­trols. Re­gard­ing se­cu­ri­ty on land, Alexan­der not­ed, “The com­mis­sion­er de­ployed some ve­hi­cles in that area in re­sponse to the con­cerns peo­ple are hav­ing.”

He added that the Gov­ern­ment re­mains com­mit­ted to pro­vid­ing a high lev­el of safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty to every­one. How­ev­er, he de­clined to com­ment on a po­lice ex­er­cise that took place in Ce­dros over the week­end.

Mean­while, Ce­dros Coun­cil­lor Shankar Teelucks­ingh al­so con­firmed that land pa­trols have been in­creased.

“I have seen it for my­self,” he de­clared. He ex­pressed sur­prise that some vil­lagers had not no­ticed the height­ened se­cu­ri­ty.

Teelucks­ingh con­firmed that na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty teams are ac­tive­ly work­ing to strength­en the re­gion’s de­fences, in­clud­ing pa­trols and in­fra­struc­ture up­grades.

“We have ex­pe­ri­enced min­is­ters in the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty, in Home­land and De­fence. I know they are work­ing se­ri­ous­ly to put the nec­es­sary de­tails in place,” he said.

Teelucks­ingh re­vealed that a high-lev­el team vis­it­ed the area over the week­end and that air pa­trols over the south­west­ern re­gion have be­gun.

“Those are some of the quick fix­es. They are work­ing on hav­ing some sort of de­tail in place while the big­ger and broad­er plans are im­ple­ment­ed.”

He added that sev­er­al long-in­ac­tive Coast Guard ves­sels are now be­ing as­sessed for pos­si­ble re­de­ploy­ment to key points along the penin­su­la. The aim is to im­prove mar­itime mo­bil­i­ty and re­sponse ca­pac­i­ty in the re­gion.

Yes­ter­day, res­i­dents said they had not seen any no­tice­able boost in se­cu­ri­ty. In re­sponse, Teelucks­ingh said some op­er­a­tions are de­lib­er­ate­ly kept low-pro­file.

“If it’s a se­cu­ri­ty de­tail, you don’t want every­body to know. Very soon, they will make the pro­nounce­ments,” he said.

He in­sist­ed that changes are al­ready vis­i­ble.

“I have seen a high­er pres­ence of the po­lice and oth­er se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies with­in the dis­trict,” he added.

Teelucks­ingh al­so ad­dressed on­go­ing up­grades at the Ce­dros Se­cu­ri­ty Com­plex, in­clud­ing dredg­ing at the jet­ty to al­low larg­er ves­sels to dock. He ac­knowl­edged that the cur­rent con­di­tion of the jet­ty lim­its the Coast Guard’s abil­i­ty to re­spond quick­ly to emer­gen­cies.

“The land­ing stage is in a di­lap­i­dat­ed con­di­tion. You can’t even have the large ves­sels come in—on­ly the small­er ones,” he said. He not­ed that this chal­lenge is be­ing ad­dressed but warned that re­build­ing af­ter what he de­scribed as years of ne­glect will take time.

“This is not some­thing the Ho­n­ourable Prime Min­is­ter can fix with a mag­ic wand,” Teelucks­ingh said. “It will take some time. Give us some time.”

Con­tact­ed for com­ment, De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge said, “I had meet­ings with two of the rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to­day and the res­i­dents needn’t wor­ry. Be­yond that, I can­not elab­o­rate for ob­vi­ous rea­sons.”