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BG
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Did Point Fortin
vote for industrialisation?
From
The editor
“While
the people of south-west Trinidad have spoken, is
it clear what they
have
said?”
ONE of the issues I kept an eye on during the
2007 general election was whether the people
of Point Fortin and La Brea would vote against
the ruling party
to protest its support for the industrialisation of south-west Trinidad.
Last year when anti-smelter groups were campaigning
to prevent the establishment of an Alcoa smelter
in Chatham, which is in the Point Fortin constituency,
Fitzroy Beache was one of the main anti-smelter
spokesmen from that region.
Apart from Beache, many of the other people who
spoke and wrote against the deepening of the natural
gas-led industrialisation thrust to include the
establishment of a 341,000 metric tonne smelter
in Chatham came from places like Maraval and Westmoorings
and Valsayn.
This is not to say that those anti-industrialisation
and anti-smelter voices were any less legitimate
because they do not live in the areas that the
Government proposes to industrialise. But it struck
me that, apart from Beache, there were few Point
Fortin and La Brea voices heard on this issue.
Well,
it seems the people of Point Fortin and La Brea
have spoken. The ruling party’s candidate
in Point Fortin, who herself lives in Westmoorings,
trounced Beache, the anti-smelter activist turned
UNC Alliance election candidate. Some 9,267 people
voted for Paula Gopee-Scoon while 2,640 people
voted for Beache. The voting in La Brea was similar
with the ruling party accumulating 10,055 votes
compared with 3,442 votes for the UNC Alliance.
While the people of south-west Trinidad have spoken,
is it clear what they have said?
According
to the new parliamentary representative, it is.
After last Thursday’s swearing-in
ceremony, Mrs Gopee-Scoon was asked about her position
on industrialisation.
Her
response: “We welcome it. South has
been forgotten a bit and we welcome industrialisation....We
have so much to look forward to and I believe there
is much more industrialisation to come for Point
Fortin. We need it.”
Francis
Bertrand, the head of the Point Fortin chamber,
told the Guardian’s Sascha Wilson
(no relation) in a story published on Friday: “I
think the people have spoken. The votes reflect
the support for the policies and programmes of
the PNM. I think there will always be people opposed
to the smelter, but the votes clearly indicate
that the majority of people in that part of the
country support industrialisation of the area and
the smelter.”
Is Bertrand right and will Alcoa return to Chatham?More
Dookeran decoding
On a related issue, last week in this space, I
wrote a piece headlined Decoding Dookeran which
some people seemed to think was meant to embarrass
the political leader of the Congress of the People,
Winston Dookeran.
Had that been my intention, the commentary would
have been published on the Thursday before the
general election rather than on the Thursday after.
Here is a piece of the interview which relates
to the use of natural gas.
Q: Mr Dookeran, what is your position on natural
gas-led industrialisation?
A: The issue there is whether or not we would
make the mistake of believing that we can monetise
our natural gas without doing the downstream.
Now I see that the Government has done some downstream
and we would just intensify that but the big ones
that have health and environmental risk may outweigh
the benefits and may use up gas reserves.
Q: You are referring to the aluminium smelters.
Is it that you would not proceed with the Alutrint
proposal?
A:
No, no, well I don’t know what the exact
contractual arrangements are, but assuming that
we can get out of that...
Environmental pollution in Point Fortin is a big,
big issue and all the people there are suffering.
Their lives are at stake. They told me that. I
walked down there and they told me that the erosion
of the sea (at Clifton Hill beach) is the biggest
area of environmental concern for Point Fortin.
And the second one is light pollution. I was not
aware we had that but I saw it there. And noise
pollution and air pollution and ground pollution.
I walked into a house there and once I walked in
I smelling gas. And the people there, the poor
children there and I say they could end up being
deformed.
So
we have to handle the environmental issues seriously.
And if we can knock the environmental
issues properly, and then the environment is related
to health too, then we look at the economics of
the relationship. I must knock the environmental
issues because it is wrong. If people have the
potential to live for 60 years and only live for
50 years because of the environment, something
is wrong with that. People come first so we must
knock that. And you can’t take the promises
of the multinationals either. And you must stop
the health risks.
Assuming that, then I would ask what is the economics
of the plan. And when I say the economics, I mean
who is going to benefit as opposed to alternative
uses of the gas. And since we know we have a short
supply, we have to know how we are going to allocate
it to here or there. I would not support it right
now.
Q: So you say no to aluminium. Would you also
say no to expanding iron and steel production,
specifically the Essar Steel proposal?
A:
The environmental issues must be addressed. I
saw the protesters there. I won’t say no
to it in general but I would insist that they can’t
move forward until they solve the environmental,
health and in that case the housing issues in Claxton
Bay. I visited them there. I walked all over this
country in the last year, you know.
There
are these three issues to knock. I met with the
company and asked them to do it and they said
they were doing it. I don’t know what happened.
I saw that it blew up again...
In
other words, you must put the people first. That’s basically my approach to Government.
I must put the people’s interest first and
then I look at the economics of the situation to
see whether it benefits my country or not.
BG
- Business Guardian is
the Weekly's Business Magazine of
The Trinidad Guardian. Petroleumworld not
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Editor's
Note: This article was first publish in The
Trinidad Guardian, November 15th 2007.
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11/ 18/07
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