RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Days af­ter Ce­dros vil­lagers called on the au­thor­i­ties to pro­tect the Chatham For­est Re­serve from a sus­pect­ed land grab­ber, more trees are be­ing chopped down.

And al­though the sus­pect­ed land grab­ber was told by the for­est rangers to de­sist from build­ing a house on the for­est edge, the roof of the house went up over the week­end.

Vil­lagers of Coro­man­del Vil­lage, Ce­dros are now de­mand­ing to know why the il­le­gal land clear­ing has not stopped.

Res­i­dents say they were as­ton­ished to see con­tin­ued con­struc­tion of the house which is perched on an in­cline off Carlisle Road, Coro­man­del Vil­lage, Ce­dros.

An­oth­er vil­lager who re­quest­ed anonymi­ty said, “We are cer­tain that this man has no pa­pers else he would have showed it to us a long time.”

Agri­cul­ture Min­is­ter Clarence Ramb­harat said the al­le­ga­tions were un­der in­ves­ti­ga­tion but coun­cil­lor for the area Shankar Teelucks­ingh ques­tioned why the au­thor­i­ties were drag­ging their feet in stop­ping the project.

He said, “We be­lieve the Com­mis­sion­er of State Lands should have stopped all for­est clear­ance while the in­ves­ti­ga­tion is go­ing on. Why is this con­tin­u­ing? Is­sue a stop no­tice now and this will be used when the mat­ter goes to court to show that he was giv­en the ad­vice to stop but he has bro­ken the law by con­tin­u­ing,” he said. He not­ed that the forests and man­groves are pro­tect­ed by the State.

“We want to know whether the State agen­cies re­spon­si­ble for pro­tect­ing the State’s land as­sets are func­tion­al. Are they prop­er­ly re­sourced and if not, why?” he added.

Teelucks­ingh said since Petrotrin closed down in 2018, land grab­bers have been steal­ing acreages at For­est Re­serve, Food Crop Road, Chatham and Green­hill Ce­dros. When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the area off Bowen Trace, Coro­man­del, Span­ish speak­ing work­ers were seen chop­ping down for­est trees and shrubs. A fence made with tree trunks and lined with six rows of barbed wire was erect­ed along Carlisle Trace.

Res­i­dents say wild an­i­mals were be­ing dis­placed by the for­est clear­ing. 

An of­fi­cial of the EMA con­firmed with Guardian Me­dia that an in­ves­ti­ga­tion is on­go­ing. The EMA is ex­pect­ed to is­sue a state­ment on the mat­ter.

Ef­forts yes­ter­day to con­tact Min­is­ter of Agri­cul­ture Clarence Ramb­harat and Com­mis­sion­er of State Lands Ban­mat­tie Seecha­ran for com­ment proved fu­tile.