
Parents of pupils attending the Elswick Presbyterian Primary School who have been forced to keep their children home because of recurring sewer problem yesterday staged a placard demonstration in front of the Moruga/Tableland Constituency Office of Dr Lovell Francis in Princes Town.
They said they are fed-up with empty promises from the Ministry of Education to fix the four-year-old problem and vowed to keep their children away from school until the sewer system is replaced.
Shelly Harripersad, the secretary of the Parent Teachers Association, said: "It has not been working since 2013. Every year we are in this category where we go down (school closes) sometimes for a whole term. Our children are home because of the fact that it smells. The children get upset, they complain of headaches, their uniforms smell of sewage. So we have decided to keep our children at home until the minister does something."
Refusing to accept anything other than a new system, she said: "What we want this time is not repairs again, we want a new system."
Harripersad said last Thursday they had a "very nice meeting" with Francis, who is also the minister in the Education Ministry, and he promised that the sewer will be pumped every week until December when the ministry will change the system.
She said on Wednesday the sewer was pumped but yesterday she was informed that the tanks were already filling back up. She said since the new school term opened the 110 students have only had one full week of school.
"The children education is suffering and if you send them to school their health is suffering," she said. Harripersad said they intend to continue their protest, which they may take to various ministry offices until the problem is resolved.
Contacted Francis admitted the ministry through the Education Facilities Company Ltd (EFCL) has made numerous attempts over the years to fix the problem without success.
He said the Presbyterian board has offered land for another sewer system to be built and last Friday officials from the ministry and EFCL visited the school and a report has been compiled.
He said the existing system was a complicated modern system which appears to be venting gases. Francis said it is either the system is fixed properly or replaced with a traditional sewer system.
In relation to the malfunctioning heating, ventilation, and air conditioning system at the Princes Town East Secondary School where parents had protested in front his office about two weeks ago, he said a meeting with officials from a specialist company, EFCL and ministry officials were supposed to have been held yesterday to discuss the problem. However, Francis said he could not make it to the meeting because it was his constituency day.