Stephon Nicholas

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Min­is­ter of Trans­port and Civ­il Avi­a­tion Eli Za­k­our has con­firmed that a date has been iden­ti­fied for the open­ing of the new ANR Robin­son In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port ter­mi­nal but is re­fus­ing to di­vulge it just yet.

Za­k­our toured the fa­cil­i­ty once again on Sat­ur­day, along­side T&T Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty chair­man Aaron Hen­ry and oth­er of­fi­cials.

The min­istry said the vis­it formed part of its on­go­ing over­sight of the ter­mi­nal as work con­tin­ues to­wards its grand open­ing.

In a What­sApp ex­change to Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Za­k­our said an open­ing date has been set but it will be an­nounced at the ap­pro­pri­ate time.

He added, “Our pri­or­i­ty is to en­sure that all op­er­a­tional readi­ness re­quire­ments are ful­ly com­plet­ed so that the ter­mi­nal is ready for ser­vice.”

Last week­end, Za­k­our al­so toured the ter­mi­nal along­side Hen­ry and To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine. A few days ear­li­er, he met Sec­re­tary of Pub­lic In­fra­struc­ture and Trans­porta­tion Nathisha Charles-Pan­tin, Li­ai­son Co­or­di­na­tor of To­ba­go Af­fairs at Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter Ash­worth Jack, and of­fi­cials from the THA and the Min­istry of Trans­port and Civ­il Avi­a­tion to dis­cuss the is­land’s trans­port in­fra­struc­ture and pub­lic trans­porta­tion ser­vices.

A me­dia re­lease said the dis­cus­sions cen­tred on ad­vanc­ing a co­or­di­nat­ed ap­proach to im­prov­ing mo­bil­i­ty, strength­en­ing trans­porta­tion sys­tems, and en­hanc­ing pub­lic trans­porta­tion ser­vices across To­ba­go.

Mean­while, the Di­vi­sion of Pub­lic In­fra­struc­ture and Trans­porta­tion yes­ter­day re­vealed that fenc­ing in­stal­la­tion is un­der­way at the air­port car park as work con­tin­ues to get the fa­cil­i­ty ready.

The Di­vi­sion of Fi­nance, Trade and the Econ­o­my has re­leased $10 mil­lion to­wards the build­out of the air­port’s in­te­ri­or for con­ces­sion­aires and beau­ti­fi­ca­tion to re­flect To­ba­go’s cul­ture and peo­ple.

In an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia in March, Au­gus­tine said sev­er­al stake­hold­ers were ad­vo­cat­ing for a grand air­port open­ing in time for To­ba­go car­ni­val, sched­uled for Oc­to­ber 30-No­vem­ber 1.

How­ev­er, Blue Wa­ters Inn man­ag­er Regi­nald Mac Lean be­lieves the open­ing date should have been al­ready di­vulged.

“If a date is set, that is great — but if it’s the best kept se­cret, that is not good, be­cause we need to start mar­ket­ing in To­ba­go,” Mac Lean said.

“When we keep se­crets too long, it back­fires on what hap­pens on the is­land, just like the Cana­di­an flight we are wait­ing on out of Toron­to. We have no clue when that is hap­pen­ing at this stage.”

Mac Lean, who al­so heads the To­ba­go Ho­tel and Tourism As­so­ci­a­tion, main­tained that an open­ing in Oc­to­ber for the an­nu­al car­ni­val is too late.

“Every­thing can­not hinge on To­ba­go’s car­ni­val. That is a two-week pe­ri­od. We have 52 weeks in the year. We need things to fill oth­er pe­ri­ods. That’s the re­al­i­ty and these things need to be mar­ket­ed prop­er­ly.”

Asked if the domi­noes are falling in the right di­rec­tion, Mac Lean said no.

“The best kept se­cret, this is­land called To­ba­go.”

The ful­ly cer­ti­fied air­port ter­mi­nal was hand­ed over to the Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty by the Na­tion­al In­fra­struc­ture De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny (NID­CO) on June 14.