Re­pair works at the Cou­va West Sec­ondary have hit an­oth­er snag, de­lay­ing the re­open­ing of the school yet again.

Cou­va West has re­mained closed since the start of the new school term be­cause of in­fra­struc­tur­al is­sues.

Yes­ter­day Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion An­tho­ny Gar­cia ex­plained to mem­bers of the me­dia at a news con­fer­ence at the Min­istry’s St Vin­cent Street, Port-of-Spain head of­fice that the school can­not be opened yet.

“When we felt every­thing was there for school to re­open on Mon­day, on Sun­day I re­ceived a phone call that a sew­er pump had failed to func­tion that caused a back­up of sew­er­age in some toi­let ar­eas,” he said.

Min­is­ter Gar­cia ex­plained they have been treat­ing with sev­er­al in­fra­struc­tur­al is­sues in the school, how­ev­er, he ad­mit­ted that it’s un­char­ac­ter­is­tic for such a rel­a­tive­ly new build­ing to be ex­pe­ri­enc­ing the num­ber of prob­lems which it has been fac­ing.

“Some peo­ple say sab­o­tage. I am not say­ing that but the fact is un­usu­al for a school to be fraught with so many prob­lems, es­pe­cial­ly a school that is on­ly six years old”.

He as­sured that de­spite the most re­cent prob­lem, the min­istry is do­ing “every­thing pos­si­ble” so the school could be re­opened this week.

“As soon as we get OSH clear­ance then things will be okay,” he said.

Gar­cia ex­plained that the min­istry has been ex­pe­ri­enc­ing chal­lenges with leaky un­der­ground pipes at the school. He said the min­istry’s tech­ni­cal team dis­cov­ered that no ad­he­sive was used in con­nect­ing the pipes which he cred­its as the cul­prit. This he said led to the pres­ence of mould and leaks in­side the walls. He al­so in­di­cat­ed that the con­crete roofs be­gan to leak due to a faulty wa­ter­proof mem­brane.

Last week frus­trat­ed par­ents grew an­gry af­ter the min­is­ter did not at­tend a sched­uled meet­ing. They protest­ed out­side the closed school, say­ing their chil­dren were suf­fer­ing and claimed lit­tle was be­ing done to en­sure they re­ceived an ed­u­ca­tion.