Plain talk, a treasure

THE EDITOR: My letter to Newsday some weeks ago asked if the high-rise office block on Independence Square South being build by developer Mr Isa Nicholas had not earlier clearly been reported as being planned to be considerably higher than the Eric Williams Financial Complex Twin Towers and having now been truncated to about the same height as the latter, if this had been done unfairly by jealous politicians and/or bureaucrats.

There were no replies. This comes as a thing of little or no surprise in a country where straight talk, plain language, clear information and truthful answers are each rare and well hidden commodities. Now I see Mr Nicholas is in the news again. This time for building in oh, so exclusive Goodwood Park allegedly without full approval. Is this tit-for-tat and butter-for-fish? Is Mr Nicholas having being denied rental income on the top several floors of his downtown office block now seeking compensation by hustling up a no-planning-permission block of flats to replace his lost rental income? Was he, in fact, given the unofficial go ahead in return for not insisting on building his office tower to the original, agreed and approved height? Could someone debunk the above or otherwise? (or, do we all have to keep quiet?

GEOFF HUDSON
Port-of-Spain