SHAS­TRI BOODAN

Bu­reau­cra­cy at the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion is con­tribut­ing to in­fla­tion in T&T, says Mukesh Ram­s­ingh, pres­i­dent of the Cou­va-Point Lisas Cham­ber of Com­merce (CPLCC).

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia on Sat­ur­day, Ram­s­ingh said de­lays with cus­toms are caus­ing un­due pres­sure on in­di­vid­u­als and com­pa­nies im­port­ing goods. He not­ed there is a slow­down at cus­toms be­cause of ad­di­tion­al checks for con­tra­band.

“Re­cent­ly there was a con­tain­er held at the port with il­le­gal con­tra­band, cig­a­rettes and al­co­hol,” he said.  “Be­cause that was held on the port, every con­tain­er is be­ing screened 100 per­cent."

The CPLCC pres­i­dent said the slow­down re­sults in con­tain­ers re­main­ing more than five days on the port. He said af­ter this ini­tial pe­ri­od, im­porters have to pay rent, a cost he ad­mits is passed down to the con­sumers. He went on to call on Cus­toms to use oth­er meth­ods to ex­am­ine con­tain­ers.

“Cus­toms has cho­sen to make every busi­ness­man pay for one per­son’s down­fall,” he as­serts. “Cus­toms is con­tribut­ing to in­fla­tion in this coun­try, when busi­ness peo­ple have to pay ex­tra to get their goods, they pass it on to the con­sumers.”

Ram­s­ingh said the CPLCC has tried in vain to get a meet­ing with the Comp­trol­ler of Cus­toms.

On an­oth­er note, the CPLCC pres­i­dent said po­lice will be beef­ing up pa­trols for Christ­mas and made a call for joint po­lice/army pa­trols.

He told Guardian Me­dia the po­lice would be po­si­tion­ing them­selves strate­gi­cal­ly since crim­i­nals can get away not on­ly via the road net­work, but al­so can es­cape us­ing a boat at the near­by Car­li Bay, Or­ange Val­ley or Brick Field fish­ing ports.

Ram­s­ingh said a more dar­ing crim­i­nal may choose to es­cape us­ing one of the two airstrips at the near­by air­port, he­li­port and flight school at Cam­den.

“Cou­va is one of the ar­eas where crim­i­nals can get away by land, sea or air if planned cor­rect­ly,” he points out.  “Lo­gis­ti­cal­ly, po­lice have to be on top of their game.”

He said the CPLCC met with the top brass in the Cen­tral Di­vi­sion and dis­cussed se­cu­ri­ty plans for the area.

Ram­s­ingh dis­closed that po­lice have more un­marked ve­hi­cles, and that the CPLCC was as­sist­ing po­lice to re­pair ve­hi­cles.

He al­so said many busi­ness­men are look­ing for­ward to pub­lic ser­vants get­ting back­pay and pump­ing funds back in­to the lo­cal econ­o­my.