KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

Al­though Car­ni­val is tak­ing place amid a state of emer­gency (SoE), busi­ness­es and vis­i­tors say they haven’t been neg­a­tive­ly af­fect­ed.

Steve Sama­roo, man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of Sama­roo’s, a well-known Car­ni­val sup­plies store lo­cat­ed in San Juan, said the SoE hadn’t af­fect­ed sales. He said the im­por­ta­tion of cos­tumes has had the great­est im­pact on his busi­ness.

“The im­pact we’ve had is the im­por­ta­tion of ready-made cos­tumes, which is af­fect­ing our sales sig­nif­i­cant­ly and I am ask­ing the Gov­ern­ment to make all Car­ni­val sup­plies du­ty-free; and in­crease the tax­es and tar­iffs on im­port­ed cos­tumes. If this con­tin­ues, you’re not go­ing to see Sama­roo’s any­more,” he said.

His plea came two days af­ter Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley em­pha­sised that cos­tumes should be lo­cal­ly sourced.

But busi­ness­es aside, vis­i­tors to Car­ni­val said the SoE isn’t stop­ping their fun this year.

Lon­don res­i­dent Che Clarke, 26, said he feels safe be­cause high crime isn’t unique to T&T.

“I on­ly land­ed yes­ter­day, went to a fete last night, it was re­al­ly good. I’ve seen the po­lice pres­ence def­i­nite­ly so it’s ob­vi­ous­ly mak­ing a dif­fer­ence but I’m from Lon­don so it’s not like crime is not where I’m from too, so it’s all good.

“I feel safe, def­i­nite­ly. It’s so love­ly. Every­one is in good high spir­its be­cause it’s Car­ni­val time. I walk the road down­town and I’m lov­ing it. I’m en­joy­ing it.”

Cyre Al­leyne, a T&T na­tion­al liv­ing in Mary­land, said she feels safer here than in the Unit­ed States.

“We feel safer at home be­cause it doesn’t re­al­ly match up be­cause we have so much crime hap­pen­ing in the States every­where and we have a lot go­ing on in our gov­ern­ment right now with the elec­tion of the new pres­i­dent and every­thing that hap­pens all the time, so com­ing home to Trinidad doesn’t feel un­safe at all. It feels like a home­com­ing, and it feels com­fort­ing.”

Al­leyne’s hus­band, Johna­ton, who is ex­pe­ri­enc­ing T&T Car­ni­val for the first time said he feels safe be­cause they’re tak­ing the nec­es­sary pre­cau­tions.

“Like any oth­er coun­try when you trav­el abroad, you have to use com­mon sense, be safe where you’re go­ing, but ul­ti­mate­ly if you’re fol­low­ing the right path, you’re stick­ing with the right peo­ple then every­thing should be okay,” he said.