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Newsday Reporter
ASSEMBLYMAN Watson Duke has identified the “real winners and losers” of Tobago carnival.
In a Facebook video on Monday, Duke said THA secretaries benefited probably the most from the October 28-30 festival
“They were the actual winners. In any case, who else got free tickets, free food, free fete? They were the winners.
“Once I compare what the people of Tobago needed to undergo, I’d say they were the losers, whenever you take a look at the sum of money they’d to spend to go a Burna Boy fete, some $800-$2,000 a ticket. Once they go there, some need to walk in barefoot since the place muddy. They need to get up within the rain with their umbrellas. Some still reeling from cold, fever.”
Duke said the inaugural carnival was a failure as heavy rain caused various events to bust.
“That whole carnival thing – failure, failure, failure. Allyuh must count allyuh losses. Hang allyuh head in shame and apologise to us. Allyuh not listening. Just like the silly man who built his house within the sand, yuh construct a carnival within the rain and need to earn a living. All the pieces bust.”
Duke said the whole lot was a disaster, as he noted the blackouts in several parts of the island on the night of the Burna Boy concert.
“Was it that that fete took all of the electricity? Or T&TEC work especially hard to be sure that place stayed lit while Scarborough and environs was shrouded in darkness?”
He said the $17.5 million spent by the THA on the carnival was wasted.
“Once we take a look at the sum of money spent on the carnival, the THA secretaries, they spending money like water for carnival within the rainy season.”
He also criticised the $20 million contract awarded to Trinidad company California Stucco Ltd to construct the Smithsfield-Dutchfort connector roads in Scarborough. The roads were officially opened last Friday.
“Now tell me, what kinda traffic Tobago have that can not be dissipated inside a ten-20 minutes, Once you see traffic bad, is any individual park up bad, some truck coming off the boat. How that road profit when a lot of the carnival was not in Scarborough, but in Crown Point and elsewhere?”
He said the cash might have been used to construct retaining partitions to assist Tobagonians who had suffered damage from landslides earlier in October.
“They never attended to that. They simply clean up the mess. Wipe it up and gone – carnival within the air.
“Rain got here again within the carnival and a few of those landslides got worse and blocked the roads.”
He said the Tobago Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) reported 12 roads were blocked in the course of the carnival.
Duke also took one other swipe on the controversial stage in the ocean at Rockly Bay, Scarborough.
“How much people dance on that stage in the ocean? How beautiful it was? Is it something that resembles the statue of Christ (Christ the Redeemer) in Brazil; the enduring figure of the Eiffel Tower; or some beautiful thing just like the Statue of Liberty?
“This stage in the ocean, was it a murals that claims, ‘Take a look at what we’ve done, come pose by this’?”
He said the placement of the stage in the ocean, next to the I Love Tobago sign, was one other faux pas, because it pales as compared.
“Now carnival finished, what is going to it’s used or? For cars to show around? What was the speed, what was the urgency, that you simply didn’t even get EMA clearance?”
He also criticised Augustine for posting pictures on his Facebook of soca stars Aaron “Voice” St Louis and Vincentian Skinny Fabulous.
“Them guys big within the dance. What concerning the little Tobagonain who searching for a bit of forward?”
He said the PDP’s mandate was to place Tobagonians on a pedestal, and Augustine was not doing this.
