Khan: Flood monies spent in UNC heartland

THE LION’S share of monies allocated by Government in 2002 for flood alleviation was spent in United National Congress (UNC) heartland territory.

This was revealed by Works Minister Franklyn Khan during his contribution to the 2003/2004 Budget in the House of Representatives yesterday. Khan reminded parliamentarians that Government allocated $50 million in its last Budget to deal with flood alleviation in Trinidad and Tobago. He then disclosed that “a significant component of the $50 million for flood alleviation was spent in the Caroni basin.” Khan scolded the Opposition for seeing things “through goggles of ethnicity and racism” and used this fact to prove that the People’s National Movement (PNM) “is not of that.”

Khan also announced that construction of the $110 million Mamoral Dam will begin in this fiscal year and will take four years to complete. Khan also said the UNC were deathly afraid of Inter-American Development Bank-funded programmes because the IDB had stringent procurement processes. He added that this was why the UNC was “three years behind” on the National Highway Programme and other projects during its six years in office.