Fishing for facts in Castara

ON SUNDAY, several officials of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) participated in a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Castara Fishing Facility, a project five years in the making.

Almost half a dozen people were needed to hold the ribbon. Chief Secretary Ancil Dennis held a giant pair of scissors. He was assisted by Division of Food Production, Forestry and Fisheries administrator Wendell Bernard; Department of Marine Affairs and Fisheries director Garth Ottley; Castara fishing community member Errol Roach; and electoral representative Farley Augustine.

All posed for the cameras. None mentioned the cost of the project.

Mr Augustine later raised the issue.

When asked for the information two days later, all Mr Dennis could say was that he did not have the details; he did not wish to be inaccurate; and, in relation to a project that had taken years, he was still awaiting the cost from unspecified project managers.

None of this prevented him from appearing before the cameras on Sunday.

This is simply not good enough. And from a chief secretary, no less. It sends a bad signal and sets a dangerous precedent which can simply deepen suspicions among those inclined to believe that in every government project there is bound to be something fishy.

It is not simply a matter of this project being one for which the Prime Minister – Mr Dennis’s political leader – has expressed open disdain. Several other stakeholders view the design of the facility as a travesty.

As far back as 2018, president of the Castara Fishermen Association Junior Quashie revealed no heed was paid to the views of the very people meant to use the facility.

“We had meetings with the former chief secretary, the former secretary of fisheries, the former secretary of tourism,” Mr Quashie said back then. “I told them, do not build the building like that…Yet you would put this big concrete jungle in front of the beach.”

The project appears to have proceeded notwithstanding all the objections raised. The final insult to injury is that we are now being told that it seems nobody has the receipts.

Not only do we need to know the cost, we need to know how this project was procured: who built it and after what processes of selection. Furthermore, while some degree of consultation took place, what consideration was paid to the clear land use and aesthetic issues raised? How could such factors be ignored from the onset?

The truth is, no matter what the price tag, the true costs of what has happened here – which amount to a shameful denigration of the natural landscape followed by a complete lack of transparency – may never be fully assessed.