RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

For more than a decade, res­i­dents of In­dars­ingh Dri­ve, Di­a­mond Vil­lage, San Fer­nan­do, have been liv­ing in fear as land­slips have caused dev­as­ta­tion in their com­mu­ni­ty.

Three hous­es have al­ready col­lapsed, with the oc­cu­pants ei­ther dy­ing or leav­ing out of fear.

The re­main­ing res­i­dents, all el­der­ly and vul­ner­a­ble, face dai­ly strug­gles as they are locked off from emer­gency ser­vices and ba­sic util­i­ties.

“It’s hell, this life is a hell life. I’m 79 and can’t even car­ry my garbage,” said Rampiary Ramkissoon, who re­lies on a neigh­bour to help her with tasks like garbage dis­pos­al and get­ting gro­ceries.

“When it rains, my home floods. The wa­ter comes in. I used to plant my lit­tle gar­den but now with the wa­ter com­ing down on our prop­er­ties we can’t even plant a gar­den any­more,” she said.

In­side Ramkissoon’s home smelt musty and damp. One bed­room was con­demned and used as a store­room af­ter a drain had to be dug to take away the gush of wa­ter which flows through the house dur­ing heavy rain.

Her neigh­bour Denise Shadrack said she spent $10,000 to make the road pass­able, but it is still im­pos­si­ble for am­bu­lances, fire trucks, or garbage trucks to en­ter.

“We’re trapped here. If a fire breaks out, we won’t be able to get help in time be­cause a fire truck can­not get in here,” she ex­plained. “The Gov­ern­ment needs to fix the road. These peo­ple have worked hard all their lives. They de­serve bet­ter.

“When it rains, it floods so we are ei­ther locked in this street or strand­ed out­side.”

An­oth­er pen­sion­er, Sheila Gan­gadeen, de­scribed how the con­stant flood­ing has tak­en a toll on her home and gar­den.

“Every­where have cracks. The cul­vert breaks off so all the wa­ter comes in­to my place,” she said.

Gan­gadeen said it was painful that when her hus­band died, the hearse could not en­ter the street.

“They had to car­ry him out and then put him in the hearse,” she said.

Gan­gadeen said she had giv­en up hope that their trou­bles would be over.

“When it rains, the wa­ter comes in, and there’s noth­ing I can do but sit and pray,” she added.

She said she used her pen­sion to build a track which the neigh­bours al­so use.

Con­tact­ed for com­ment, Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal said he was aware of the sit­u­a­tion.

“I will send my staff Mon­day morn­ing to lend as­sis­tance and call in the lo­cal gov­ern­ment work­ers to as­sist. We will al­so look at pos­si­bil­i­ties for re­lo­ca­tion. I am aware of the land slip­page in that area which has been a con­cern for many years,” he said.

Chair­man of the Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion Gow­tam Ma­haraj said the land slip­page is a long-stand­ing con­cern and stems from slip­page along Pa­pourie Road.