Indarsingh: 'Follow health, safety rules for roadworks'

COUVA South MP Rudranath Indarsingh has expressed concern about the absence of health and safety regulations at roads under construction, after the death of accident victim prison officer Richard Ali.

He is calling on Works and Transport Minister Rohan Sinanan to investigate claims by the Ali family that poor lighting on the Freeport worksite may have led to Ali's death.

He said recipients “of multi-million-dollar government contracts” must observe the appropriate health and safety standards and signage to protect drivers and others who use the roads.

He also urged Sinanan to collaborate with Public Utilities Minister Marvin Gonzales to improve lighting for drivers and commuters on the roads.

“I am deeply concerned, not only as an MP, but as a motorist, about the absence of health and safety standards which should be adhered to by contractors in relation to the ongoing expansion of the highway between the Chaguanas and Chase Village flyovers.

“This is critical especially during the current rainy season where motorists traversing both the northbound and southbound lanes cannot distinguish between the actual road and the construction site.”

He said the problem is further exacerbated by consequential flooding.

Indarsingh told the Newsday, “Family members of the prison officer have reached out to me to investigate whether poor lighting could have negatively impacted his ability to realise that there were stationary vehicles and equipment parked along the highway.

“These vehicles were being used in the installation of safety rails along the highway between the Chaguanas and Chase Village flyovers.”

Newsday also asked for a response from Sinanan to the claim, but he is yet to reply.

Indarsingh said Ali’s death and that of UWI scholar Nicholas Bisson, another constituent of Beaucarro Village, Freeport, who also died in a road accident, should spur Sinanan to act with urgency and ensure contractors adhered to the rules so lives could be spared.

Bissoon died when his BMW car skidded and collided with concrete barriers along the Churchill-Roosevelt Highway, El Socorro, on November 23. The car burst into flames, killing Bissoon before help arrived.

“I call upon Sinanan to collaborate with law-enforcement agencies to immediately investigate and determine the factors that led to their deaths,” Indarsingh said in a subsequent statement on November 27.

“Vehicular accidents continue to occur on our nation’s roads and Sinanan must collaborate with Gonzales to improve the public lighting for motorists and the travelling population who commute along the Churchill-Roosevelt Highway between Sea Lots, Port of Spain and beyond Grand Bazaar.

He said there are vast areas within these boundaries which are not properly lit at nights because the lights do not work.

Similar conditions exist at Maritime Roundabout, Barataria; the Grand Bazaar Interchange; the Couva/Preysal Interchange; the Caroni roundabout near the Licensing Authority; Washington Junction roundabout on the Southern Main Road, Caroni; Claxton Bay overpass; and the Rivulet Road intersection, Indarsingh added.

Ali, 43, was returning home from a casino in Chaguanas between midnight and 1 am, when he tried to overtake a vehicle on the southbound lane of the highway near T&TEC, Freeport.

His Mitsubishi Lancer crashed into a truck parked on the side of the road. The truck had a road sign attached to it. Fire officers used the jaws of life to free Ali from the mangled wreck.

His sister Christiana said there was a caution sign in the dimly lit area, but not at a sufficient distance to allow him to slow down or avoid the truck.

His distraught mother Nerawatee said workers on the site told them the lighting was also insufficient for any driver to see the parked truck.

She believes her son who was healthy, young and strong, could have been alive if the lighting was better.

His common-law-wife of 24 years, Usha Sankar, said he left home around 7 pm on November 26.

“He was well dressed and smelling sweet, sweet. He hugged and kissed me and told me, ‘I am going to win. I am going to win’."

She said she woke up around midnight with a strange pain in her stomach, around the same time he may have died.

A year ago, also on November 26, 2023, poor lighting and inadequate signage at the Guapo Roundabout on the Point Fortin Highway, was blamed for the death of popular radio DJ Clyde Jemmott.

Jemmott, better known as Clyde the Outlaw, was returning to his Morvant home around 4 am after playing at a party in Point Fortin when the accident happened.