RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Hob­bling along teary-eyed, with a cane in hand, pen­sion­er Dhan­wan­tee Sinanan gin­ger­ly tried to cross a sink­ing wood­en bridge at Oli Mo­hammed Trace in Pe­nal.

The fear of falling in­to the Tiri­pan Riv­er is ev­i­dent on her face as she gazes at the riv­er be­low.

Since No­vem­ber, the bridge has been slow­ly sink­ing, mak­ing it treach­er­ous to cross.

Sinanan said she had pains in her foot and be­cause of the con­di­tion of the bridge she had to leave her home and stay at her daugh­ter’s res­i­dence. 

Dur­ing a protest yes­ter­day, res­i­dents said they want­ed the Min­istry of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment to fix the bridge as soon as pos­si­ble as it was af­fect­ing more than 20 house­holds.

Sinanan’s daugh­ter-in-law Shamin Sinanan said garbage trucks and taxis no longer tra­verse the area.

“We have to walk for half a mile to put out our garbage. If any of us get sick, am­bu­lance can­not come in. We need a bet­ter bridge,” Shamin said.

Point­ing to a heap of garbage piled in bags at the side of the road, Shamin said it was un­fair that res­i­dents had to go through this dis­tress.

“We are hu­mans too. We pay tax­es and we are en­ti­tled to the same ben­e­fits as oth­ers,” she added.

Shamin not­ed that it was dan­ger­ous to cross the riv­er as the wall was col­laps­ing un­der the bridge.

“ Peo­ple can­not walk safe­ly across. Since they threw the ma­te­r­i­al on top of the bridge a few peo­ple take a chance to cross but it is not safe. Most peo­ple park their cars out the road and walk to their homes,” she con­tend­ed.

She ex­plained that if the bridge col­laps­es, res­i­dents will have no way to get out of the com­mu­ni­ty.

“We have farm­ers here who have lots of crops to har­vest. How will they go for their crops if they have no way to pass,” she said.

An­oth­er res­i­dent Shamil­la Hamil­ton said she was fed up of cost­ly ve­hi­cle main­te­nance.

“I punc­tured my tyre here and I al­ways have to change parts be­cause of the con­di­tions. It’s like I am work­ing on­ly to fix the car,” Hamil­ton said.

She added, “We want them to build a wall and put a con­crete bridge for us. We are pay­ing tax­es like every­one else and we de­serve to get equal treat­ment as peo­ple in oth­er com­mu­ni­ties.”

An­oth­er pen­sion­er, Par­ba­tee Ram­per­sad, who is par­tial­ly blind, said she too faces dis­tress when­ev­er she has to cross the bridge.

“I on­ly have one eye. It is a scary feel­ing be­cause any­time that bridge will fall. They need to fix it as soon as pos­si­ble,” she added.

Ram­per­sad said she goes to Pe­nal each week to get med­i­cine.

“Taxis don’t want to come here. They drop us out by the road and we have to walk in. Some­times they charge us $20, $30 and $40,” she added.

Con­tact­ed for com­ment, Min­is­ter of Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment and Rur­al De­vel­op­ment Kaz­im Ho­sein said the res­i­dents can ex­pect re­lief soon.

He said the con­trac­tor col­lect­ed his let­ter to be­gin works on Mon­day adding that mo­bi­liza­tion will be­gin by Tues­day and ac­tu­al works should start this week.