Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@cnc3.co.tt

The con­tro­ver­sial po­lice post at the Ed­die Hart Recre­ation Ground in Tacarigua drew a high-lev­el se­cu­ri­ty vis­it yes­ter­day, even as the dis­pute over its con­struc­tion at the recre­ation grounds re­mains un­re­solved.

Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der, Deputy Com­mis­sion­ers of Po­lice Ju­nior Ben­jamin and Suzette Mar­tin and Chief of De­fence Staff Don Po­lo vis­it­ed the post.

Guardian Me­dia at­tempt­ed to speak to Alexan­der dur­ing the tour, but he opt­ed not to take any ques­tions.

This vis­it comes days af­ter Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion (TPRC) chair­man Josi­ah Austin chal­lenged the man­ner in which the post was be­ing es­tab­lished.

Austin has main­tained the TPRC is not op­posed to the po­lice post, but has raised con­cerns about the lack of con­sul­ta­tion, plan­ning and the nec­es­sary in­fra­struc­ture as­sess­ments be­fore con­struc­tion be­gan.

The con­tro­ver­sy in­ten­si­fied af­ter Austin claimed the struc­ture was built over an in­ac­tive Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny (NGC) pipeline, rais­ing ques­tions about the safe­ty and en­gi­neer­ing as­sess­ments con­duct­ed be­fore con­struc­tion. The NGC, how­ev­er, has in­di­cat­ed the lines are no longer in use.

The Gov­ern­ment has de­fend­ed the project, which is of a wider na­tion­al crime-fight­ing ini­tia­tive. The Ed­die Hart post is among 30 be­ing es­tab­lished across the coun­try, with the fa­cil­i­ties in­tend­ed to serve as op­er­a­tional bases for joint po­lice and army units.

The TPRC, mean­while, has main­tained that its con­cerns were nev­er about pre­vent­ing the es­tab­lish­ment of the po­lice post, but about en­sur­ing that Gov­ern­ment projects on re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tion prop­er­ty are prop­er­ly planned, co­or­di­nat­ed and ex­e­cut­ed.

Yes­ter­day’s high-lev­el vis­it comes just days af­ter Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Khadi­jah Ameen called on the TPRC chair­man to put the chal­lenge to the po­lice post to rest.

Austin, how­ev­er, has main­tained the cor­po­ra­tion’s con­cerns re­main valid but says they have still not been ad­dressed.