Thugs destroy Arima URP office over non-payment of ‘ghost gang’ cheques

PAYMENT of wages was stopped on Wednesday at the Arima Unemployment Relief Programme office at O’Meara Road, Arima, as workers had to scamper when a group of irate thugs barged into  the office and began destroying everything from furniture to stationery. The attack started when a new paymaster refused to hand out salary cheques to persons who did not have the right identification cards. After several reports of “ghost gangs” operating in Arima, a special team was sent out from the Ministry of Local Government to view the payment process. The team visited and reported back to its seniors that it had seen persons who neither worked in the programme, or worked in an unrelated area collecting a number of cheques either at the Port-of-Spain office, or at the Arima office and distributing the cheques to unknown persons.

In several cases persons did not turn up to collect the cheques, or turned up later, but in both cases the cheques were found cashed at certain Syrian stores in the borough. Because of this, the paymaster was changed and when he insisted he was not paying without  proper identification “all hell broke loose.” Based on information reaching Newsday on Thursday, when the paymaster tried to resume the payment,  the thugs returned and started to issue threats. Malabar police were eventually called and calmed down matters while the payment of monies was turned over to officials of the Ministry of Local Government, Kent House. When Newsday spoke to URP officials at the Arima office, they confirmed a blossoming ghost gang programme was going on in both Arima and Arouca North.

“Between both areas there are about 50 registered URP gangs but only about 35 are really doing any  work. The rest are ghost gangs where certain persons appear on pay day before cheques are handed out and, together with a certain official, go through the bundle and pull out certain cheques. “Sometime later, persons will turn up saying their names were called but they never collected their cheques, or never knew there were cheques for them, but it was later found the cheques had been cashed. “This is a slap to Minister of Local Government, Reginald Dumas, who claimed there were no more ghost gangs in the URP. Ghost gangs are alive and well and flourishing,” said one official. senior officials investigating confirmed the report of the attack in Arima because of non-payment of ghost gang cheques and the investigations of similar happenings in other regions. Malabar police confirmed they were called out to quell a disturbance at the office. Work was stopped indefinitely on all URP projects under the Arima office.