Barrackpore protest over bad roads continues

Barrackpore residents continued protesting on Tuesday, blocking major roads with burning debris and calling on the authorities to fix the roads.

Residents blocked Rees Road as well as the nearby St Croix Road, which connects Barrackpore to Princes Town.

Mini-mart and food shop owner Anil Mahadeo, of St Croix Road, told Newsday he had been severely affected.

“I lost a lot of customers and business is very slow.

"Driving on this road is no bed of roses. People say they want to come but the road is too bad. The business is two houses away from Rees Road,” Mahadeo said.

“The road was not always this bad. From January to now, workers scraped Rees Road three times and never followed up on paving it.

"A truck came this morning to put yellow boulders in the road. We do not want that here. We want good materials. We want the road paved.”

For the past few weeks, residents have protested and demanded that the roads be paved.

On Tuesday,they accused the authorities of making “broken promises,” adding they want “no patching.”

Residents also held up placards, some of which read, “Broken Promises Fix D Road,” “Bad Road,” and “We rel fed-up.”

Another resident cited a San Fernando-based contractor, adding, “The road in front of that business was paved, not patched.

"So what happened to the people of Barrackpore? We are people too, and we have many producing oil wells in the community.”

Police and fire officers later cleared the roads, but residents vowed to continue until the roads are repaired.

Newsday contacted the Ministry of Works for a comment and is awaiting a response.