Tension between Sando mayor and business association head

SEETA PERSAD

A war of words appears to be heating up between San Fernando Mayor Junia Regrello and San Fernando Business Association (SBA) president Daphne Bartlett after Regrello dismissed last Saturday’s meeting at which the escalating crime rate was discussed by members of the association and senior police.

“Whatever was said at any meeting held by Bartlett and others does not concern me,” Regrello said, adding that he is the mayor and is charge of San Fernando.

He said a meeting earlier in the week, which had been hosted by his office, had addressed the crime situation and that meeting had been attended by businesspeople, the municipal police and city corporation. “Yet Bartlett is calling people and cancelling my meeting.”

“I run the city,” he said and described Bartlett as a “go-to” in San Fernando saying she was “never elected in a democratic process to head any businessman association.

“I do not recognise Bartlett and she has no authority to speak on behalf of any business association because it does not exist.”

Regrello acknowledged a rift between them, saying this happened when Bartlett was removed as chair of the San Fernando Waterfront Project after the 2015 general election.

But, he said, “This had nothing to do with me. It is the Minister of Planning who is in charge of these positions.”

Regrello has been holding meetings to deal with various security and traffic issues in San Fernando.

In reply to claims made by deputy mayor Vydia Mungal-Bisessar at the SBA meeting at the arcade in San Fernando on Saturday, Regrello said the deputy mayor did not represent the corporation at that meeting and whatever she said was “null and void.”

In her defence, Bartlett directed Newsday to a YouTube video dated March, 2017, in which the mayor acknowledged the SBA. The video, by Hollis Clifton, shows Regrello thanking the SBA and Bartlett for inviting him to a function.

Bartlett said the association had invited the police, San Fernando West MP Faris Al-Rawi and Regrello to the meeting. She said the MP was unable to attend and the mayor was to represent him.

However Regrello said he did not have any invitation.

She also said, “I am not looking for some sort of supremacy. I was offered to be the Mayor of San Fernando by former prime minister Patrick Manning and also by Kamla Persad-Bissessar and I refused.” She said she had no interest in politics.

“My main concern is safety and growth and development of San Fernando.”

Snr Supt Zamsheed Mohammed said the San Fernando police would continue to support the businesses as well as the mayor.

But he said, “It is difficult to deal with two different bodies at this time and I am hoping that they come together for the betterment of San Fernando.”