SASCHA WIL­SON

The long-await­ed de­mo­li­tion of the cen­tu­ry-old San Fer­nan­do Mag­is­trates Court at Har­ris Street has be­gun to­day.

The de­mo­li­tion is be­ing done as part of the clean-up cam­paign un­der the Min­istry of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment.

Over the years, there had been nu­mer­ous com­plaints that the build­ing was an eye­sore and a health and safe­ty haz­ard.

The old court build­ing was “tem­porar­i­ly” closed in Sep­tem­ber 2017 and the five courts res­i­dent there were re­lo­cat­ed to the Mad­i­nah Build­ing and the San Fer­nan­do High Court for a month, to fa­cil­i­tate ur­gent ceil­ing re­pairs and as­bestos clean­ing.

The Ju­di­cia­ry then ex­tend­ed the clo­sure to 13 No­vem­ber 2017 but not­ed that even af­ter the roof re­pairs were com­plet­ed, mi­nor works would still have to be done in­side the build­ing.

The five courts from the old court build­ing have since been re­lo­cat­ed to the High Court. Works start­ed on the build­ing, but then stopped, and it de­te­ri­o­rat­ed sig­nif­i­cant­ly. In 2020 prison in­mates as­sist­ed in phase one of the de­mo­li­tion.

In a re­lease in Jan­u­ary this year, the Ju­di­cia­ry stat­ed:

"Giv­en the pan­dem­ic and the fact the de­mo­li­tion could not be done by the Min­istry of Works and Trans­port, due to fac­tors that im­pact their im­ple­men­ta­tion of the project, the Ju­di­cia­ry has sought al­ter­na­tive means of ex­e­cut­ing the de­mo­li­tion project.”

It fur­ther stat­ed that ef­forts were un­der­way to pro­cure a con­trac­tor to com­plete phase two of the de­mo­li­tion project, which was ex­pect­ed to be done in with­in the first quar­ter of 2022 year.

Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Faris Al-Rawi is ex­pect­ed to be at the site soon.