Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior Re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

The Di­rec­tor of the Pro­gramme for Up­grad­ing Roads Ef­fi­cien­cy (PURE), Hay­den Phillip, along with eight oth­er of­fi­cials, have been placed on ad­min­is­tra­tive leave ef­fec­tive yes­ter­day.

Works and In­fra­struc­ture Min­is­ter Jear­lean John de­clined to com­ment on the rea­sons be­hind the de­ci­sion. When ap­proached by Guardian Me­dia, she re­ferred all ques­tions to Phillip, say­ing: “You need to ask Mr Phillip.”

Sources close to the mat­ter con­firmed that the of­fi­cials have not been dis­missed, de­spite wide­spread spec­u­la­tion cir­cu­lat­ing on so­cial me­dia.

For­mer Works and Trans­port Min­is­ter Jack Warn­er al­so de­clined to com­ment when con­tact­ed.

While the spe­cif­ic rea­sons for the ad­min­is­tra­tive leave re­main un­clear, spec­u­la­tion has arisen about pos­si­ble in­ter­nal re­views. Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar had pre­vi­ous­ly an­nounced that the An­ti-Cor­rup­tion In­ves­ti­ga­tions Bu­reau would be asked to ex­am­ine projects re­port­ed­ly car­ried out by the PURE unit, the Na­tion­al In­fra­struc­ture De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny (NID­CO), and the Drainage Di­vi­sion un­der the pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tion.

The PURE unit was es­tab­lished in 2002 un­der for­mer PNM Min­is­ter of Works and Trans­port Arnold Pig­gott, with Phillip among its first of­fi­cials. Ac­cord­ing to the Min­istry of Works and In­fra­struc­ture, PURE be­gan as a short-to medi­um-term so­lu­tion to ad­dress dis­tressed roads and has since evolved in­to an en­ti­ty re­spon­si­ble for project man­age­ment ini­tia­tives that pro­mote healthy roads across the coun­try.