With their hands clasped and on bended knees, students of a primary school named after an Opposition MP yesterday urged Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley to open their new school saying they were falling sick in their make-shift classrooms.
Even though passing motorists honked their horns to pass and protesters blew whistles, the pupils of Dr Roodal Moonilal Ramai Trace Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha (SDMS) Primary School remained on the centre of the road for over ten minutes before they walked to see their new school covered with vines and debris.
President of the PTA, Indar Jairaj, said the pupils have been housed in the cramped Hanuman Hindu Mandir at Goodman Trace, Rock Road, Penal, since March 2015 as works on their new $32 million school took place.
When the new Government took office, the contractor stopped works, Singh said.
“It’s more than a year now and our children are suffering. They are staying in a 20 by 60 temple all the way in Rock Road. Our children are vegetarians for the past 15 months. They cannot carry not even an egg sandwich to school,” Jairaj said.
Saying ten pupils fell ill inside the temple, Jairaj begged for an end to the children’s suffering.
“We don’t want highway or railway, money or jewels. If you can open half of the school we will be happy,” Jairaj said.
Sharon Moses, whose three children — Shawn, Shakeil, and Shaneille — fell ill said the temple did not have proper toilets.
“Every day the smell of urine is very high,” she added.
Contacted yesterday, Oropouche East MP Moonilal said he raised the matter in Parliament and was told that construction on the school was stopped because of limited resources. He said the school was 85 per cent complete and called on Government to find resources to complete it.
In response, Minister of State in the Ministry of Education, Dr Lovell Francis, said he would try to alleviate the students’ concerns.
Saying the Education Facilities Company Ltd, whose responsibility was to build and repair schools, had already started paying contractors with clean invoices. Francis noted that the bill owed to contractors was over $800 million which represented more than the ministry’s Public Sector Investment Programme (PSIP) allocation.
“It is a massive sum so it is impossible to pay $800 million plus owed to contractors. You understand the difficult situation we are in because we have to repair the schools that are not repaired, try to pay contractors and still have to find money to start the new projects,” Francis said.
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