Hosein: No more evicted councillors

Kazim Hosein
Kazim Hosein

LOCAL Government Minister Kazim Hosein says he has given an assurance that councillors will not be evicted from their offices due to unpaid rent. He was speaking yesterday in Parliament as the Standing Finance Committee considered expenditure for 2019 on the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development.

Couva North MP Ramona Ramdial asked about the line item for operations of electoral district offices for councillors and expressed concern about the decrease of $83,000 and allocation of $650,000 for 2019.

"In light of what have been happening to some of our councillors – I have a sitting councillor, Councillor (Allan) Seepersad who did not receive any allocations for rental for his offices – and I am seeing a decrease here for the San Fernando City Corporation. Is this a trend or a pattern that we are going to see with the other regional corporations?"

Couva South MP Rudy Indarsingh said: "Tell them how they put all the furniture on the road."

Ramdial said: "Yeah boy. The man don't have an office."

Hosein said actually San Fernando received an increase from 2017 which was adequate for every office. Caroni East MP Dr Tim Gopeesingh said some of the councillors in the Chaguanas Borough Corporation were not being paid and were being evicted from their offices because fees were not paid.

Finance Minister Colm Imbert asked the chair if Gopeesingh was asking a question. "It's based on a false premise."

Gopeesingh replied: "You not letting the minister answer. You the minister of local government too? I know you're minister of everything but..."

Hosein said three councillors were affected including one in Couva and one in Rio Claro. "And I gave the assurance that this would not happen again."

He said he liaised with the chairman of the Couva/Tabaquite/Talparo Regional Corporation and Rio Claro Regional Corporation and he was also working with the Finance Ministry.

Chaguanas West MP Ganga Singh asked whether the minister had investigated claims by Cunupia councillor Vandana Mohit that her home was shot at because she was fighting corruption at the Chaguanas Borough Corporation. Hosein said the shooting was a police matter but Mohit had written to him and he intended to respond accordingly.

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"Hosein: No more evicted councillors"

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