Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

Se­nior Re­porter

Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) To­ba­go po­lit­i­cal leader An­cil Den­nis is ac­cus­ing the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) of plan­ning to qui­et­ly shut down the is­land’s Com­mu­ni­ty-Based En­vi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion and En­hance­ment Pro­gramme (CEPEP) and Un­em­ploy­ment Re­lief Pro­gramme (URP), but on­ly af­ter vot­ers head to the polls.

Speak­ing at a po­lit­i­cal town hall meet­ing in Calder Hall on Thurs­day night, Den­nis claimed the cur­rent THA ad­min­is­tra­tion in­tend­ed to stop those pro­grammes but was de­lay­ing the move for po­lit­i­cal sur­vival. He said his in­for­ma­tion was that the ad­min­is­tra­tion had al­ready agreed to end the pro­grammes, but was wait­ing un­til af­ter the elec­tion to avoid los­ing votes.

Den­nis said a PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion would main­tain both so­cial em­ploy­ment pro­grammes and, if nec­es­sary, fund them di­rect­ly from To­ba­go’s al­lo­ca­tion.

How­ev­er, last month, Fi­nance Sec­re­tary Petal-Ann Roberts con­firmed that both pro­grammes would con­tin­ue, stat­ing that the As­sem­bly planned to make CEPEP and URP more sus­tain­able, ef­fi­cient, and pro­duc­tive.

Dur­ing the fo­rum, Den­nis al­so un­veiled a sweep­ing de­vel­op­ment vi­sion for Scar­bor­ough, in­sist­ing the city’s long-promised up­grades col­lapsed af­ter vot­ers re­ject­ed the PNM’s ear­li­er pro­pos­als. He crit­i­cised the in­cum­bent rep­re­sen­ta­tive’s $2 bil­lion plan, say­ing the plan lacked clar­i­ty on fund­ing sources. Den­nis said a fu­ture PNM THA would pur­sue a more re­al­is­tic, phased ap­proach to trans­form­ing the cap­i­tal.

On the pub­lic side, Den­nis out­lined sev­er­al ma­jor ini­tia­tives. He said Scar­bor­ough would be trans­formed in­to a green city, with re­designed side­walks, unique street sig­nage, and ex­pand­ed land­scap­ing. The city’s re­de­vel­op­ment would com­bine sim­ple fix­es with more elab­o­rate projects.

Among the flag­ship pro­pos­als, Den­nis said the PNM plans to build a new cruise ship vil­lage, com­plete with an ad­di­tion­al cruise ship pier. The plan al­so in­cludes es­tab­lish­ing Ca­lyp­so Rose Boule­vard, re­viv­ing the PNM’s pre­vi­ous ef­fort to move over­head util­i­ty lines un­der­ground.

A Scar­bor­ough Wa­ter­front Com­plex would pro­vide du­ty-free shop­ping, restau­rants, pub­lic of­fices, and a trans­port hub. The Botan­i­cal Gar­dens would be ex­pand­ed and mod­ernised, fea­tur­ing wa­ter el­e­ments, wildlife, and event spaces. A mul­ti-storey parkade would be con­struct­ed and con­nect­ed to the Wa­ter­front Com­plex via a sky­walk.

Den­nis al­so re­vealed plans for a ho­tel site at the bot­tom of Bur­nett Hill and a gov­ern­ment cam­pus next to the leg­is­la­ture. In ad­di­tion, a sky ca­ble car would link the Es­planade to Fort King George.

Den­nis said all of these pro­pos­als form part of the PNM’s up­com­ing man­i­festo and rep­re­sent what he called “re­al de­vel­op­ment” for Scar­bor­ough.