Stop dragging heroes' names through the potholes

THE EDITOR: There are very few instances where I can admit to something good from Government MPs.

However, I shall give credit to the MPs who were instrumental in restoring the Morris Marshall Water Tanks in Laventille.

While you did a good job and did the right thing to rename it, I have noted that the MPs involved appear to have shamelessly obliterated the contribution made by Sadiq Baksh during the Panday administration.

Is it that you set out to be deliberately divisive? You have a Minister of Communications who should have researched this and at least clarified why this aspect of the restoration was omitted. So the tanks were left to ruin for almost 15 years and up comes Santa Marvin and company to claim restoration. Fro this I cry shame!

It's a nice gesture to preserve such a heritage site and they should not forget the picturesque water trough just after CGA. Moreso, it's good to recognise sons and daughters who have achieved and excelled as well as those who really gave themselves in service to the people. Morris Marshal was one such person. But so was Muriel Donawa McDavidson yet she was never honoured with as much as a tile in her name in Balisier House.

But not everyone can go Laventille without a platoon of police and soldiers to guard them. So when I heard MP Scotland say that the water in the tank was pumped from El Socorro, I was left to wonder: what about those people living in El Socorro and Barataria who have been complaining for years of no water?

These MPs take one step forward and ten steps back.

We must recognise people with integrity and a proven track record of service to the nation. We should not name a promenade after a national hero yet leave it to be rundown and degraded to the point where it has become an outdoor latrine for the homeless.

We should not name a stadium after a sprint king – once the fastest man in the world – yet deny him a parking space for his car and a seat for him to sit on. Stadiums should be for sport events not fetes and for ministers to do the limbo at flea markets.

We should not name a street after a beauty queen (the first of African heritage to win the crown) then leave it to become so dilapidated that there are more potholes than smooth road on it. This is a shameful state of affairs.

Mind you, an $11 million swimming pool was opened in Maloney, but people in east and deep south have to knock pot and pan in protests over bad roads and dry taps. Who does this government think it is fooling? It seems a certain level of madness has overcome the government.

Recently, I saw a counsellor trying to spread Christmas cheer among the children, and that's great, don't get me wrong. But what this councillor really ought to be doing is walking with a crew, buckets of mortar and rubble, or pitch and try to patch up the potholes. The cry in every single corporation, whether PNM or UNC, is that there are no materials to repair potholes.

Imagine the international stink if one of Santa's reindeer break their hooves while trying to navigate the sleigh through one of the thousands of potholes in our nation's roads. Ho ho ho!

LINDA CAPILDEO

St James