Shas­tri Boodan

Free­lance Writer

Cunu­pia res­i­dents blocked War­ren Road with burn­ing tyres yes­ter­day de­mand­ing that the gov­ern­ment im­me­di­ate­ly re­pair the di­lap­i­dat­ed road.

The protest start­ed around 6 am, block­ing ac­cess to com­muters from com­mu­ni­ties along the South­ern Main Road who use the road to get to the Uri­ah But­ler High­way.

Ch­agua­nas West MP Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly warned that protests would in­crease in his con­stituen­cy and oth­er parts of the coun­try un­less the au­thor­i­ties at the Min­istry of Works and Trans­port “get off their bloody butts and start do­ing their work.”

He said oth­er roads in the com­mu­ni­ty need ur­gent re­pairs, in­clud­ing Ajod­ha Road, Ram­saran Trace, Be­ju­cal Road, Moore Trace, Ram­lal Trace, Al­li­ga­tor Trace and Al­li­ga­tor Vil­lage.

Ac­cord­ing to Ram­bal­ly, res­i­dents al­so plan to protest in front of the Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion.

“The gov­ern­ment is un­der-re­sourc­ing the cor­po­ra­tions, we are fed up with beg­ging, plead­ing to get the roads fixed,” he said.

Ram­bal­ly said he had raised the is­sue of the roads in Par­lia­ment and writ­ten to the rel­e­vant min­istries but all his ap­peals have fall­en on deaf ears.

“The peo­ple are get­ting an­gry and they are go­ing to in­ten­si­fy their demon­stra­tions,” he said.

Works and Trans­port Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan said War­ren Road is un­der the purview of the Tu­na­puna Pi­ar­co Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion. He sug­gest­ed that Ram­bal­ly work with Kam­la Pha­goo, coun­cil­lor for Kel­ly Vil­lage/War­renville, to get the road re­paired

Sinanan said the Works Min­istry is work­ing with the Min­istry of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment on road re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion projects across Trinidad. He ex­plained that projects are as­sessed and pri­ori­tised pend­ing the avail­abil­i­ty of fund­ing.

The min­is­ter said while many peo­ple felt re­cent road paving work was a ploy for the Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tions, that work will con­tin­ue un­til all roads are re­paired.