Stu­dents of San­ta Flo­ra Gov­ern­ment Pri­ma­ry School had to be evac­u­at­ed from their tem­po­rary quar­ters at Beach Camp, Pa­lo Seco on Tues­day af­ter an elec­tri­cal pan­el box be­gan spark­ing out­side the school.

In an in­ter­view, pres­i­dent of the Par­ents Teach­ers As­so­ci­a­tion, Troy Gan­ga said a to­tal of 242 pupils, 15 teach­ers, three clean­ers and a se­cu­ri­ty guard had to flee Beach Camp fa­cil­i­ties be­cause of the threat.

He said in 2015, the en­tire school was re­lo­cat­ed to Beach Camp be­cause the ex­ist­ing school struc­ture was deemed un­safe.

Beach Camp was sup­posed to be their tem­po­rary ac­com­mo­da­tion for on­ly six months on­ly but Gan­ga said the chil­dren have been at­tend­ing class­es there for three years.

Con­struc­tion of a new school start­ed and the build­ing is 80 per cent com­plete, he said.

"Works have stopped for years now be­cause the con­trac­tor was not paid. He told us once he gets his out­stand­ing mon­ey, con­struc­tion will re­sume," Gan­ga said.

He not­ed that around 11.30 am, the faulty pan­el box be­gan emit­ting a crack­ing sound and sparks were seen.

"It was dif­fi­cult evac­u­at­ing the chil­dren be­cause Beach Camp is far and some of the ex­its are not ac­cept­able. The build­ing was not de­signed to house 242 chil­dren. We want the new school to be fin­ished. Beach camp is not suit­able. We have had prob­lems with the sew­er and the elec­tri­cal sys­tem. Every Mon­day morn­ing we have some is­sue and this is not good for our chil­dren," he said.

Gan­ga said the pupils have been un­able to par­tic­i­pate in zon­al games be­cause of in­ad­e­quate fa­cil­i­ties.

"We are a school which par­tic­i­pat­ed in every­thing but we are be­ing de­nied. Our SEA chil­dren are fac­ing a dis­ad­van­tage," Gan­ga said.

He not­ed that the par­ents should not have to con­sid­er protest­ing to get the school com­plet­ed.

"We are ask­ing for mean­ing­ful di­a­logue. We do not want to en­gage in protest. All we are ask­ing is for our new school be com­plet­ed," he said.

How­ev­er, Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion An­tho­ny Gar­cia said the Min­istry will be pay­ing all con­trac­tors who are owed mon­ey with­in the next few days.

"That school is a con­struc­tion site and it is in the hands of the con­trac­tor. We have to ne­go­ti­ate terms and con­di­tions so that we can have a re­sump­tion of con­struc­tion. We are mak­ing every ef­fort to pay con­trac­tors monies that are owed to them. I can as­sure you that in a mat­ter of days, all con­trac­tors who have been owed will be paid, so we will re­sume con­struc­tion of that school short­ly.

He al­so said that be­fore the con­struc­tion could re­sume statu­to­ry ap­provals had to be grant­ed from WASA, T&TEC and the Siparia Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion.