Derek Achong

Works and In­fra­struc­ture Min­is­ter Jack Warn­er says road re­pairs in Pt Fortin and La Brea will not be af­fect­ed by the lim­it­ed state of emer­gency. Warn­er made the state­ment yes­ter­day dur­ing a tour of San Juan and San­ta Cruz with St Ann's East MP Joanne Thomas. "I will speak with the con­trac­tors to en­sure they ap­ply for spe­cial pass­es for their work­ers," he said. "Work in La Brea end­ed this morn­ing at 4 am with no prob­lems," Warn­er said. Last Thurs­day, Warn­er ini­ti­at­ed a $21 mil­lion road­works pro­gramme af­ter mas­sive protests by res­i­dents of the af­fect­ed ar­eas. The re­pairs were ini­tial­ly sched­uled to take place at night-time be­tween 8 pm and 5 am.

When asked by re­porters about his views on the lim­it­ed state of emer­gency and cur­few an­nounced by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar on Sun­day, Warn­er said he ful­ly sup­port­ed the ac­tion. "The time has come where we have to in­sti­tute se­ri­ous mea­sures to com­bat crime," he said. "If what we (the Gov­ern­ment) is do­ing is not pop­u­lar with some, I am sure it is right." Dur­ing the tour yes­ter­day, Warn­er vis­it­ed sev­er­al res­i­dents in La Canoa Road, San­ta Cruz, and La Hoe Road, San Juan, who were com­plain­ing about poor road con­di­tions and drainage. Warn­er promised the res­i­dents that his min­istry would as­sess the con­di­tions and take im­me­di­ate ac­tion to fix drains and re­pair their road­ways.