Cumuto road will take years to finish—Director

The Cumuto Main Road is in a mess and will take years to be repaired if done properly. Director of the Programme for Upgrading Road Efficiency (PURE) Hayden Phillip said this during a brief telephone interview. The main road which connects several communities in the Tamana area to Sangre Grande and Arima was put under the microscope again yesterday as over 100 residents protested deplorable conditions. The protest was a repeat action carried out by the residents late last year for the same reason.

Following last year’s Tamana protests, Member of Parliament for the area, Collin Partap and Works Minister Jack Warner, had assured residents that their concerns would be addressed. PURE was subsequently assigned responsibility for maintenance and repairs of the road. However, with PURE being at a current standstill, so, too, are the repairs to the roads. Phillip said work on the Cumuto Main Road was supposed to have been done in phases.

He added, however, that PURE was not in a position to do any kind of repairs at this time because of the programme’s inactivity. “As money was released to PURE we conducted repairs,” said Hayden. “We had done some drainage work and road patching but the Cumuto Main Road is a major project. It is in a mess and is a project that would take years to finish if done properly,” he said. Phillip said work had been scheduled to be done early this year. Residents in the community remained disenchanted and spoke of broken promises by Partap.

“This is the road that we have to use in order to get to Arima and Sangre Grande and it has remained in a deplorable condition for the past 30 years,” said Felix Diaz, spokesman for the residents. “They (Partap and Warner) promised quick relief but the road has gotten worse, with large potholes,” said Diaz. “It has been like this for over 30 years. Governments come and governments go and nothing is being done,” Diaz complained.
 

Partap responds

Member of Parliament for the area, Collin Partap, in a telephone interview yesterday, said he had communicated with residents on Monday and had agreed to go with a few of them to meet with the Works Minister. “I do not have the funding to complete a project like this and so I have to rely on the Ministry of Works to get a status report on the project,” Partap said. He said work had already begun on the project but it would not be completed overnight. “If you pave the road without the proper infrastructure it will fall apart and then this situation would occur again,” he said. Partap is expected to meet with Warner to discuss the repairs of the Cumuto Main Road today.