Dwight Yorke Stadium in disrepair

THE Dwight Yorke Stadium, Bacolet, Tobago, one of five erected to host the FIFA Under-17 World Championship two years ago, is in a sorry state of disrepair.

Fixtures at the $100 million facility just east of Scarborough, are rapidly deteriorating due to lack of “preventative maintenance” according to Tobago House of Assembly Chief Secretary and Sports and Youth Affairs Secretary Orville London. To further compound the matters, the question of responsibility for the stadium remains a complicated one yet to be sorted out between the original owners/contractors, the Ministry of Sport and the THA.

London noted that it would take a “substantial investment” to return the stadium to its original state, while expressing serous concern over the shocking situation which they “still have not been able to address” at present. “There has been little preventative maintenance done since the stadium was constructed, and therefore the rate of deterioration is much greater than we would have anticipated even if we have to deal with the elements and the sea-blast and so on,” London said at the weekly post-executive council meeting press briefing. “The Dwight Yorke Stadium is not in a satisfactory condition as far as I am concerned,” London lamented. He said, “there were a number of issues contributing to this startling development, the responsibility of the original owners/contractors, and then of course the role of the central government and the role of the THA.”

London explained that the THA and the Ministry of Sport have been attempting to treat the matter with the owners/contractors in a way that will give us some degree of comfort that we would be able to deal with the major concerns. “But that has not been operationalised to the extent where we are comfortable,” London said. In terms of maintenance of the ground area, he said they had already reached agreement that one of the CEPEP gangs will handle this aspect. “But I think the big problem is the actual preventative maintenance, the corrosion that is becoming evident and the areas of serious deteroriation over the past months,” he added. London noted that it was “a challenge to maintain a structure of that type in that kind of environment which was prone to sea-blast and so on. “But it is a bttle that we have to win, otherwise the facility is going to deteriorate, and fast,” he warned. London said, “there has to be a substantial investment to bring the facility back up to a certain level, and then of course an equally significant investment in preventative maintenance so that we may be able to address the situation.”