State com­pa­ny Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um Com­pa­ny Lim­it­ed has been au­tho­rized by En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries Min­is­ter Stu­art Young to as­sist the To­ba­go Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency and the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly with their oil spill clean-up ef­forts.

Min­is­ter Stu­art Young, and Works and Trans­port Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan met with To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine a short while ago at the THA's Mo­bile Com­mand Cen­tre in Scar­bor­ough to dis­cuss the oil spill off Ca­noe Bay, To­ba­go.

Ac­cord­ing to Min­is­ter Young, the min­istry has been in con­stant com­mu­ni­ca­tion with the THA and the To­ba­go Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency since learn­ing of the in­ci­dent on Wednes­day morn­ing and a min­istry team has been in To­ba­go help­ing on the ground since Thurs­day night.

" TEMA and THA have in­di­cat­ed that they are deal­ing with the mat­ter and have the lead.

"The Min­istry of En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries has been con­sis­tent­ly com­mu­ni­cat­ing with TEMA and oth­er stake­hold­ers since be­ing alert­ed to this sit­u­a­tion. TEMA and the THA have in­di­cat­ed that they are deal­ing with the mat­ter and have the lead. The Min­istry stands ready to pro­vide tech­ni­cal sup­port and as­sis­tance," Min­is­ter Young said.

On Wednes­day morn­ing, a ves­sel sank a few hun­dred me­tres from the Cove Eco-In­dus­tri­al Park coast, spilling fu­el. The oil has made its way to the coast­lines of sev­er­al coastal vil­lages, in­clud­ing Lam­beau, Low­lands, Pe­tit Trou Beach, as well as the Scar­bor­ough wa­ter­front.

On Thurs­day, dur­ing an emer­gency press con­fer­ence, THA Chief Sec­re­tary de­clared the in­ci­dent a dis­as­ter and said in­ter­na­tion­al as­sis­tance may be need­ed.