Dear Editor,
I think it is time to act. Enough has been said and enough has been seen. Marshon, Annandale is in decadence. This is so because the `authorities that be’ are totally silent. These ‘persons with vested authority’ are acting in a most irresponsible manner. I mean at least three important leaders saw what had begun to happen.
I go back here to the 2011 National and Regional Elections. The now president, Donald Ramotar, Anil Nandlall (current Attorney General) and Irfaan Ali, still head of Housing and Water and now acting head of Tourism, all saw the signs -squatting and its accompanying squalor. They did promise to address the matter and haven’t.
These squatters are responsible for the horrible ‘fishy’ reek that blows from the north-east. Now this stench is very uncomfortable. It makes for all kinds of adjustments -keeping windows closed, staying indoors etc. In the general area, a lot of ‘fish businesses’ are being done, but these are way out, and very close to the actual Seawall. These squatters have no consideration whatsoever.
Now get this, many times, the entrails, skeletons (bones) and heads of these various kinds of fish are just dumped in the drain that runs across the dam, that leads off from the once High Dam. The road is now good, but what sense does it make when travelling is easy, but ‘living’ is difficult. The longer this goes on, the worse it becomes for all of us -I speak here on behalf of the many affected people. First it was the smell, and this has descended into a blocked drain. What next?
Well here is the answer.
The number of squatting adobes is on the rise, and the children’s playfield is being rudely invaded. This area was a swampy mess. Many times, government refused to give any kind of aid in converting this marsh. Now that the villagers have ‘made something out of nothing’ it is being encroached upon by the insensitive group of squatters.
Dear readers, as you can see, I am very upset. Apparently no one is listening. Does this mean that just as the literal ‘quagmire’ was changed by hard, self-help work, that it must also be reclaimed in the same way? This means that the ‘good’ ones will have to act, and I am sure if and when this happens, then the authorities will come and really ‘act up.’
I close by declaring that a grave injustice is being done -both from a national stand point and from the villagers’ perspective.
Again, I call on the authorities to simply ‘up’ and do the right thing.
Yours faithfully,
Shane Alli,
Rajaram Bodie,
Sankar Rampersaud et. al.
