Today’s Trinidad Express features a story on the construction of a new home for the Prime Minister, and though I normally keep my political ranting and opinions to myself what struck me as being most incongruous about this article is not that it is going to cost tax payers $148 Million dollars but that the construction is due to be completed by JULY 2007!
About $148 million is to be spent on the construction of a new residence and diplomatic centre for the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago.
The project has a completion date of July 2007.
Tourism Minister Howard Chin Lee made the announcement on behalf of Prime Minister Patrick Manning as he responded to a question raised on the project by Opposition Senator Wade Mark during yesterday's sitting of the Senate at the Red House, Port of Spain.
Mark's question was addressed to Manning, an MP in the House of Representatives.
"The official residence is $36 million. The diplomatic centre, $55 million. Design fee, $11 million. Mobilisation insurance, etc, $14 million. External works, $32.1 million," Chin Lee said.
He said the project, as had been designed by a local architectural firm, was going to reach the $200 million mark until the China-based Shanghai Construction Group (SCG) was hired to do the job.
Juxtapose that, if you will, with the other headline on yesterday’s newspaper stating that construction has come to a halt on the New Carnival Centre that was slated to be completed by 2008. So you are telling me the foreign architects hired to build the Prime Minister’s house can finish that construction in three months yet since the last revelers chipped through the streets of Port of Spain NOTHING has been done to the Savannah in the same THREE MONTH time frame!
Construction of the proposed $450 million National Carnival and Entertainment Centre has come to a halt because the design is being reviewed.
Prime Minister Patrick Manning made the announcement yesterday almost a month and a half after the Urban Development Corporation of Trinidad and Tobago (Udecott) said the Request for Proposals for the project were to have been issued "in the coming weeks".
"The Carnival Centre is on hold because of the events of Carnival this year and the need to rethink the design in the face of all of that," Manning said during the sod-turning ceremony for the $800 million 26-storey Broadgate Place Plaza shopping complex in downtown Port of Spain.
At the post-Cabinet news conference at Whitehall, Port of Spain, on February 22, Culture Minister Joan Yuille-Williams said construction of the National Carnival and Entertainment Centre would not be completed in time for Carnival 2008.
She said it would be built by 2009, which means masqueraders could find themselves parading on the road in front of the Queen's Park Savannah next year, as they did for Carnival this year.
Now since I am privy to certain information concerning the proposed Carnival Centre, I personally know that it could NEVER be completed by the projected completion date of 2008 and had no hopes of playing mas anywhere but the on the streets again next year. So when I hear that date being thrown around by the politicians in charge I think to myself just another ploy to string us along. Mas will continue to be on the streets for the next couple years, I will be shocked if there is the brand new spanking centre ready for mas in 2009! As for revamping the plans for the Centre I have yet to see anything “new” so who knows how long that will take and how long again before the sod turning ceremony and when actual construction begins.
Maybe Joan Yuille Willams needs to fire UDEcott and hire the China-based Shanghai Construction Group if she is serious about providing a stage for masqueraders anytime in the near future. While the Prime Minister (or new Prime Minister given that General Elections is carded for later this year) will be sitting pretty in a brand, spanking, new “crib” we masqueraders will have to eat dust on the streets of Port of Spain for the next few years only because we truly LOVE the mas! This just goes to show, yet again, how much priority is really given to what is trumpeted as “The Greatest Show on Earth”.
source: www.trinidadexpress.com
Maybe Joan Yuille Willams needs to fire UDEcott and hire the China-based Shanghai Construction Group if she is serious about providing a stage for masqueraders anytime in the near future. While the Prime Minister (or new Prime Minister given that General Elections is carded for later this year) will be sitting pretty in a brand, spanking, new “crib” we masqueraders will have to eat dust on the streets of Port of Spain for the next few years only because we truly LOVE the mas! This just goes to show, yet again, how much priority is really given to what is trumpeted as “The Greatest Show on Earth”.
source: www.trinidadexpress.com
14 comments:
so i guess the carnival route needs to be altered for carnival 2k8, with the parade route ending at the prime minister's new residence!!!
Ha ha!! If again, mj!
... Yet another reason why Trini politicians cyah be taken seriously. All they do it lie, lie, lie... and like themselves too damn much...
Ah well, wah yuh go do? I had a damn good time on d road last year, and (God willing) I will again next year. I eh holdin my breath for ANYTHING from de government...
Well I'm upset...very UPSET!!! Can't anyone bring this to people's attention and have something done about it!? This is so frustrating! I MISS my carnival stage :(
HI Saucy
I heard this story about the T&T's Prime Minister's new residence on my way to work today. They had stated that they are now using a local contractor and the cost which was 200 million had been reduced significantly to the 148 million...which is still alot of effing money.
They also stated it would be completed in 12 months
Regarding the Carnival Centre....thats a damn shame....looks like nuthin in gine happen until Carnival 2010 at the rate they going
Not being from Trinidad and having only really started being aware of, and playing, Trinidad mas for the first time in 2007, will someone please describe to me what this Carnival Center is supposed to look like. As a virgin I had a ton of fun on de road.
c2k7v here is the link to the post I did about the centre:
http://saucytrini.blogspot.com/2006/10/national-carnival-and-arts-centre.html
Marcus all the media says the construction of the new residences will be completed by July this year!! BTW I met your team at the Wedding Expo :D
Thank you Saucy for the link. Seeing as how I am a carnival newbie I'm sure that there might be something I'm missing about the whole carnival centre thing and it's importance, however, I liked parading outside in the open, fresh air. I liked the heat and the refreshing break when the rain started coming down every so often. Being all inside like that doesn't sound as fun, maybe it's just me. Seems that all that is really needed is an actual stage to cross along with some logistical parade route planning.
c2k7v you really missed out on being on the big Savannah stage..... I don't think anything can compare to that! Also the Carnival Centre is supposed to have retracting roof and all that jazz... I guess the powers at be think it would be a step in modernising Carnival, taking it from the rickty Savannah to this "posh" venue :S
can anyone say BA-BALLS
"WE" still don't care about our culture in this country.
"WE" prefer to spend millions for a "Diplomatic Centre" for which Diplomats? The Chinese embassy moving to the PM Residence?
Saucy I too don't like politics in my blog and keep the ramblings to myself but this is real "BA-BALLS"
c2k7v I think that you are a little confused. You will still have the road experience, the "stage" that you've heard a lot of us talking about missing was the "pot at the end of the rainbow" ; ) So this centre is really just to replace the stage not the road experience leading up to it.
Thank You Triniprincess, I guess I didn't think the whole concept all the way through. Not having experiencing carnival before this year makes it a little hard to conceptualize the new centre, as I do not know how it was before. Anyway, I am trying to be at every carnival and play mas from now on, so I'll be a little more seasoned next time around.
i played mas for the first time in 06 and in 07 I SORELY missed that stage. I mean yes, waiting for an hour to cross the stage wasnt great but crossing the stage. i get teary eyed thinking about it. I had a ton of fun getting wild in the streets but i felt a lil too cramped with all the big trucks and mass of ppl to not have that stage to run freely across.
Now if the culture minister was a diehard carnival jumbie like our highly esteemed President, yuh done know we woulda been all up in de "new" savannah since this year carnival! *steups*
I live in the St. Ann's area. It looks to me that construction has been going on in the area of the PM's residence since before Christmas. I'm not sure that they'll be done by July, but they could probably get the roof and walls up at least.
Post a Comment