N Touch

New prostrate surgery in TT

MEDICAL history was created at the San Fernando General Hospital yesterday when Guyanese urologist, Dr Deen Shar-ma, performed an operation to reduce bleeding during prostate surgery.

The operation involves injecting a solution into the prostate gland during trans-utrinal prostate surgery. The technique, developed by Sharma, utilises a single injection called vaso-pressing injection. Normally, the operation results in excessive bleeding in which patients have to be administered several pints of blood. Dr Sharma, who has published several papers in the British Journal Of Urology, said the procedure was designed to “make a quite difficult operation fairly simple”. He identified the major problem of prostate operation to be excessive bleeding. This, according to the doctor, clouds the urologist’s view when performing the operation.

Dr Sharma said the technique “halved the bleeding” making the operation safer for the patient. The urologist, who has performed the procedure for the past 10 years, said the operation was “an original work”. Dr Sharma said the procedure involves injecting the prostate with a solution before commencing the operation. “That solution reduces blood loss by half, which means we can better see what we are doing,” he said. “Less blood loss translates into better visibility with translates into a safer operation.”  Dr Sharma said the cost for the operation would also be reduced by using his technique.

‘The man still living, come and stab him’

A COURT heard details yesterday of the betrayal and murder of Clint Huggins by his cousins and friend for $3 million. The plot was hatched between Leslie Huggins and his uncle Joey Ramiah, less that a year before Clint Huggins was killed.

According to prosecution witness Swarsatee Maharaj, Leslie promised to kill his own cousin because Joey said Clint had collected money not to testify against Dole Chadee, but still went ahead and did so. Because of this,  Leslie said, Clint deserved to die.  He vowed to kill him and collect the $3 million. On February 20, 1996, a Carnival Tuesday, Leslie made good on that threat. He, together with his cousin Arnold Huggins and friend Junior “Heads” Phillip, murdered Clint Huggins on the Uriah Butler Highway, Mt Hope.

According to the detailed testimony of 25-year-old Maharaj, the former common-law wife of Leslie, Clint was shot twice, knocked down with the car, stabbed several times and beaten on the head. He was then placed in the back seat of the vehicle and it was set ablaze. Maharaj was testifying before Justice Alice Yorke- Soo Hon in the Port-of-Spain Third Criminal Court where the trio is on trial for the murder. They are being represented by Ian Stuart Brook, Keith Scotland and Dawn Mohan, Osbourne Charles SC and Christlyn Moore. Prosecutors are Wayne Rajbansee and Natasha George.

 Maharaj said she, the three accused, Simon Ragoonanan and Clint were on their way to Port-of-Spain from Sangre Grande, in two cars, a Lancer and a Laurel. On reaching the Uriah Butler Highway, the cars stopped. Arnold came out from the Lancer with a gun in his hand and went to the Laurel. Clint, who was drunk in the back seat of the Laurel, came out the other side. Arnold pointed the gun at Clint and fired over the hood, hitting Clint in the head. Clint staggered, leaned into the window of the Laurel where Leslie was sitting in the driver’s seat and said: “You know what you doing boy? Forget this and let us go back home.” But this time Ragoonanan, who was driving the Lancer,  drove off and made a U-turn and came back on the opposite side of the road to where the Laurel was parked. A second shot rang out and Maharaj saw Clint running towards the Lancer with something like blood on his jersey. Leslie drove the Laurel across the median and bounced Clint with the car into a chain-link fence.

Phillip and Arnold ran towards the Laurel. Leslie came out the car and the three of them lifted Clint from in front of the Laurel and placed him in the back seat, but only Clint’s leg remained in the car and the upper body was outside on the ground. Leslie told Ragoonanan: “The man still living, come and stab him.” Leslie also told Phillip and Arnold to stab Clint. Leslie had a black handle fishing knife in his hand and he stabbed Clint in the upper region of his chest about eight times.  Leslie then returned to the Lancer and said: “ The man dead now.” Arnold took out the “music” from the Laurel and set the vehicle ablaze to make it look like a robbery. The gang then drove off at high speed back to Sangre Grande. On the way Leslie and Phillip threw their jerseys and sneakers out the window.  Back at home they also dumped their jeans in the latrine.

Clint, who was a  State witness against Chadee and his gang for murder, was being kept in a safe house at Teteron Barracks but he frequently ran away from the safe house and visited his cousin and others in Sangre Grande. Joey Ramiah, who knew of Clint’s frequent visits, suggested to Leslie to kill Clint. He said Chadee will pay him $3 million. Leslie’s plan was to do the job and bury the money in his back yard. However, when Clint made his Carnival Sunday surprise visit, Leslie had no gun so he had to find one. He and Ragoonanan discussed the matter and  recalled that Arnold, who lives at Matura, had a gun. It was decided that Leslie would visit Arnold. Clint, Maharaj and a man called “Sharky” were doing a lot of “partying.”. On Carnival Monday night while they were in Sangre Grande, Arnold was supposed to shoot Clint in the crowd but things did not go according to plan. 

Maharaj told the jury that she and Leslie walked to Market Street where she saw Arnold standing alone between two vegetable stalls. “Leslie told me that Arnold was going to shoot Clint in the crowd tonight,” she said.  Shortly after Phillip told Leslie:”It cannot be done tonight, there is too much people.” Maharaj understood that to mean they could not kill Clint. Back at Leslie’s Mulchan Road home, after killing Clint, the gang concocted a story to tell the police. They were to say that Clint borrowed the Laurel to buy a packet of cigarettes and never returned. To make that story more believable, Leslie ordered Maharaj to call Clint on his pager and leave a message inquiring about the whereabouts of the car. Maharaj said Leslie told her that she had to stick to that story otherwise he would kill her just like he killed Clint. She said she did as she was told because she knew what Leslie was capable of doing.

Brook, who represents Arnold, was the first attorney to cross-examine Maharaj yesterday. He wanted to know among other things why she did not warn Clint that Leslie wanted to kill him. Her reply was that they were cousins and she was afraid Clint would have told Leslie and harm could have come to her. She was also afraid of trying to dissuade Leslie from killing Clint for the same reason.

Local cops praised by forensic expert

MELVIN ZWAIG, head of a Canada-based forensic and investigative consulting firm, heaped praises on local police officers yesterday for their methods of investigations. Zwaig said he was pleased to see the high level approach to investigations and dedication to duty of police officers in this country.

Zwaig Consulting was contracted by Government to provide training on investigations into all aspects of financial wrongdoings. Police officers and specially selected employees of the Auditor General’s Office and the Special Security and Facilities Management Unit of the Ministry of the Attorney General, who were exposed to the training, were presented with certificates at the end of the three day-training yesterday. Participants were exposed to the base level of forensic accounting and investigation of all aspects of financial wrongdoings. They were also given first hand information on improving their oral and written skills in reporting findings to superiors, other law enforcement agencies, prosecuting attorneys as well as testifying in the courts. Participants also received training on increasing the understanding and comfort level of the relevant agencies with respect to financial accounting and reporting.

Police Commissioner Hilton Guy said he was grateful that the Office of the Attorney General recognised the need for training and put things in place to ensure that it took place. He added that change is inevitable and the police must recognise that they must be exposed to training to assist them in their work.“You either update your skills, or you become irrelevant in the society in which you live,” said the Commissioner. Guy said he was heartened to learn that more training sessions are being organised. Attorney General Glenda Morean, who also delivered brief remarks at the function, said she recognised that in the past not much effort was placed on enforcement and efforts are being made to ensure that training is available. The AG said she believes the training improves the application of strategic and tactical techniques to enhance the effectiveness of investigations.

Red House petitioners

INDEPENDENT Senator Professor Kenneth Ramchand said yesterday he was surprised that instead of replying to the petitioners, Prime Minister Patrick Manning chose to speak to one of the persons who signed.

He was responding to statements from the Prime Minister that he had spoken with one of the petitioners who said he was satisfied with the Prime Minister’s explanation and recanted. However, Ramchand said yesterday that “from the newspaper reports, what I read the Prime Minister to be saying is that he offered an explanation to the petitioner and the petitioner was satisfied with the explanation and the petitioner also said that if he/she had had that explanation before the petition, he/she would not have signed”. “(According to the Prime Minister) the petitioner also said that it was his opinion that if the rest of the petitioners were to be given that explanation they would withdraw the petition,” Ramchand noted. “In our letter to the Prime Minister we suggested to him that we wanted to talk. “If the Prime Minister really has additional evidence or arguments that are likely to persuade us, we are not irrational people. And therefore he should speak to us. “I await an invitation to a meeting in response to the petition,” he said.

Caricom single market must move faster — Bernal

Director General of the Caribbean Regional Negoti-ating Machinery (CRNM) Dr Richard Bernal said the Caribbean Single Market and Economy is in danger of slipping behind regional free trade negotiations.

Bernal was speaking after a meeting between Canadian International Trade Minister Pierre Pettigrew and Caricom Trade Ministers on Monday. He said the Caricom Single Market and Economy is supposed to help the region prepare for regional and international free trade agreements. It should also serve as a base to build a negotiating position. “What is happening now is that the external agenda is moving so quickly that we are being faced with issues in the external negotiation that we have not yet resolved in the single market,” he said. “What it means is that the single market process must not slip in terms of implementation. It should actually be speeded up.”

At Monday’s meeting the two sides discussed the possibility of a trade agreement to, in Trade Minister Ken Valley’s words, “lock in” the duty-free access some Caricom goods now enjoy. The new agreement will be two-way but both Valley and Pettigrew noted the need for special and differential treatment for less developed economies in the region. Bernal said special treatment must have a place in all free trade talks. “There is no absolute free trade,” he said.  “What we are talking about are agreements which liberalise trade. “Yes, in broad principle this is about reciprocal trade but we are always careful to add the caveat of special and differential treatment for small developing countries, particularly the OECS countries.” Bernal added, though, that the private sector in Caricom must take the opportunity to prepare for the increased competition the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) will bring.

Speaker’s vote breaks 14-14 deadlock

DEPUTY House Speaker Hedwidge Bereaux had to use his casting vote yesterday to save Government from being defeated on the simple issue of the one-week deferral of two questions, one written and the other for oral answer.

The questions, from UNC Caroni East MP Ganga Singh, dealt with whether any legal matters were settled by WASA between December 2001 and January 2003, and the monthly expenditure and revenue for the same period. At the start of the session, Acting Leader of Government Business Colm Imbert announced that the questions would be deferred for one week. However Singh argued that his questions had been on the Order Paper for over three weeks and had been continuously deferred. Deputy Speaker Bereaux put the question to the members for the one week deferral and got a resounding “no” from the Opposition benches with “ayes” from the Government benches.

The Opposition called for a division and at the end of the tally there was a 14-14 result. Bereaux used his casting vote to “maintain the status quo”, a comment which drew laughter from the Opposition MPs. Moments later UNC MP Winston Dookeran walked in followed by PNM MP Diane Seukeran. But before the House could get down to the business of debating the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic (Amendment) Regulations 2003, Leader of Govern-ment Business, Kenneth Valley, who arrived late for the sitting, requested a five-minute break to consult with his colleagues. Bereaux suspended the sitting for ten minutes.

Pointe-a-Pierre MP Gillian Lucky, in her contribution to the debate which eventually got going, spoke about the legal implications of the Act. She said in typical fashion Government had not held consultations on the Act. She said Govern-ment was acting on the mistaken belief that stiffer penalties would make enforcement easier, but resources had to be made available to the police to ensure compliance. Referring to the Minister of Works, Franklyn Khan’s claim that magistrates were reluctant to prosecute because there were no specific offences under specific regulations, Lucky said magistrates who were already traumatised by their impending move to Trinidad House, will be further traumatised by having to decide on two competing penalties. She said serious problems would be caused if the regulations were affirmed.

Lucky urged Khan to find a justification for the Act and not treat the Opposition the way Government has been treating the Chief Justice and Caroni workers. Lucky also warned government to not only look at the “integrity of vehicles” but at the “integrity” of the persons who drive them. She referred to Khan’s decision to give a PBR pass to Jamaat-al-Muslimeen leader Yasin Abu Bakr, saying public opinion was that the decision was not a good one.

Woeful bureaucracy

BUREAUCRACY, it seems, is really killing us.

A piece of expensive and greatly needed equipment is donated to the San Fernando General Hospital, but it is still not in use a year after it was delivered. The once efficient Emergency Health Services is now a badly ailing unit because only eight of its 46 ambulances are in operation; the other vehicles are laid up for want of repairs. A quantity of important drugs donated to TT by FEEL was only cleared by the Customs Department after an appeal was made to the Minister of Health. What is happening here? Do the people in charge of these matters really care?

The $9 million lithrotripper, a machine used for shattering gallstones, has been lying idle in a container on the grounds of the San Fernando Hospital since last year with apparently no serious effort made by the SWRHA to have it in operation. The relief of pain and suffering this machine could bring is enormous; it can be measured in the fact that some 300 persons afflicted with gallstone problems are seen at the hospital every year and, because there is no lithrotripper to treat them, they must wait at least two years before they can receive remedial surgery.

The problem with this machine, it seems, was purely technical and easily solvable. According to Clive Pantin, CEO of FEEL, donors of the lithrotripper, the SWRHA was informed that an expert from the US was available to commission the machine “and all he wanted was that he and his wife would be put up” during his visit. Pantin said he had witten several letters to the Authority and had even spoken to Health Minister Colm Imbert about the gallstone machine but all to no avail. As a consequence of this official indifference, it is only natural for the board of FEEL to become distrustful about arranging for equipment from abroad to be donated to the SWRHA.

The attitude of the Authority’s bureaucracy to this valuable and useful gift is unbelievable. Instead of welcoming the donation and cooperating fully and actively with FEEL to have it in operation, the SWRHA apparently chose to ignore the caring gesture. The emasculation of the once effective EHS ambulance service seems the result of another bureaucratic failure. There appears to be no other explanation for the almost total breakdown of maintenance of the ambulance vehicles, 38 of them becoming inoperative over a period of time. There is no need to emphasize the importance of such a service, since its prompt response in cases of accidents, heart attacks, sudden breakdowns or other emergencies could mean the difference between life and death.

Only recently there have been complaints from persons who claim that their desperate call for an ambulance went unheeded. Relavives of Reynold Ramnath said they waited in vain, more than two hours, for an ambulance when the Malgretoute gardener was pinned under his tractor which had overturned. Eventually, an off-duty fire officer who lives in the area, got a Fire Services ambulance to respond. Ramnath was pronounced dead on arrival at the San Fernando General Hospital. When musician Andre Tanker was stricken with a heart attack two weeks ago at his Maraval home, his relatives dialled the 999 emergency number but, to their dismay, they were informed that there was no ambulance operating in that area. Even at the risk of asking him to “micro-manage” we would appeal to Health Minister Imbert to review the operations of the country’s ambulance service to ensure its good order and to ensure that bureaucracy does not kill us. 

Towards a better civil society

I was motivated to write this piece because of what I see as an increasingly high level of hypocrisy pervading our society. Before the October 7, 2002 elections, I held the view that whichever of the two main political parties (UNC and PNM) wins, Trinidad and Tobago will come out of it as the loser, and I have seen nothing as yet to change that perception.

My opinion was based, without favour, on the stupid and unproductive tit-for-tat racial politics of both parties, and most significant, a divided civil society that encourages and perpetuates the nonsense that has now entered a new phase, identified as the “blaming game” that has also entered the media call-in talk shows where objectivity and impartiality are scarce. We need political parties but what we need are democratic parties with a transparent vision and nation-building policies that can offer a united people’s government which will serve the interest of every class, creed and race in our society.

Civil society has not as yet faced the reality that both parties have worn the corruption boots while in Government and one is just as guilty as the other of political racism. Being subtle about it does not change the policy, and the danger of political racism is that it also serves as a cover for the people who practice class discrimination to remain unobserved. The performance of the Government and the opposition beg the question: Is party supremacy more important to the nation than genuine national unity.

I am not in a position to say we have terrorists in our land but I do know that we have too many people in this troubled rainbow country who have lost their sense of reason. When will these two parties and their supporters realise that nothing substantial in the interest of TT can be achieved without bringing the nation together as one in unity. I pity the poor and less privileged who innocently play an active part in perpetuating self-centered politics that is not in their best interest. Politically correct slogans can be meaningless if the will to make them a reality is not there. Are we in “a time for healing” or have we passed that stage?

Politicians cannot escape blame for the state of the nation today but my sense of reality tells me that the main culprit is our divided civil society, who just don’t get it. The society is helpless as a result of partisan politics that makes it incapable of supervising its servants who have assumed the role of masters. Because of its obsession with politics of division, society is unable to be true to itself and get to the root of problems and analyse them without bias, instead of viewing them merely from the service.

For example, every time there is a reason to start another debate about the madness on our roads, numerous suggestions come up such as: teaching defensive driving and issuing certificates. It is not that our drivers cannot drive or read road signs, the problem is more in our carefree lifestyle. The madness is in the heads of drivers who are “Trinis to the bone” (who abuse defensive drivers) manifesting the nation’s culture of indiscipline and lawlessness – maintained by the lack of law enforcement that has much more to do with our political culture than meets the eye.

We have litter laws but Mr and Mrs “Trini to the bone” who observe that the garbage truck did not pick up their garbage will solve that problem by putting it into their car and drive into some other residential area and dump it. They do it because lawlessness are in their bones. Adults complain about the lack of discipline among our young people without accepting responsibility for the problem. First of all, we must not put all the blame on parents. Civil society as a whole must share the blame for creating the social environment in which the parent and child lives. For example, while some of the less-privileged but responsible parents are trying to keep their children on the road of moral and spiritual values, they face the enormous task of protecting them from the impact of negative influences pervading society. The truth of the matter is that the adults have shown them the way and continue to do so. So what should we expect? If we are to solve a problem, we must first know all about it, especially its beginning. We have to go back into the past and study the nature of the relationship between parent and child as it existed at that time.

If we clinically examine the past, seeking hard facts, we will discover that mothers were the main pillars of “spiritual and moral values” in a society that shared those values and were conducive to proper upbringing of the nation’s children at that time. A time when, in the absence of the parent, the teacher, neighbour and even total strangers acted as the long arm of parental love and discipline. We must then investigate “when” and “why” those values began to fall apart. From my perspective, the trail will most likely lead to the beginning of the social revolution known as the “Women’s Liberation Movement” that had an unavoidable impact on traditional family values and customs (the class and status of the women in society who started and led the revolution is another story.)

As a result, the number of working women in TT began to rise, creating the need for child care facilities – especially among the less fortunate – that did not exist, leaving many children unsupervised on a daily basis. The movement energised the career woman and gave new life and meaning to “single parent” that added to the problem of child neglect. While the women’s movement may have started the ball of child neglect rolling, the momentum was taken up by modernisation in the name of progress. Television became the most sought after “babysitter” that had a foreign accent.

Modernisation and the new adult way of life impacted in many ways on the behaviour of our youth population. As our nation moved rapidly towards a connection with the modern world, adult society became obsessed with materialism that took us beyond the neglect of our children into a new culture underlined with contradictions, double standards, immorality, violence, sex and promiscuity to which they (the youth) were exposed via cable television, video games, bogus role models and trips abroad.

Related to the neglect of the nation’s children is the education system that has always been void of a level playing field, and that is putting it mildly. As far back as 1982, a former Government Teachers College Principal, Elodie Bissessar, told graduates at a ceremony that the present emphasis on quantity education without the corresponding qualitative value merely emasculated the system and hindered productivity, and that the mad rush for paper qualification depersonalised education, leaving little room for the personal development of the child.

She said the education system is too obsessed with examinations and the child today is bombarded with competition and his/her concept of success and getting ahead is directly opposed to “co-operation” since he/she must always strive to be better than the other child. She went on to say that in the haste to provide quantity education, the society had destroyed one of the purposes of education which is “to allow the child to live and live with people”.

The politicising of the education system is another problem. However, space will not permit me to bring to the fore the numerous ills adult society has inflicted upon youths of our nation. The bottom line however is that we as a people must be realistic and work towards uniting our divided population to gain the strength to resolve all our problems that threaten the nation’s future — Prayer gives all our problems hope but not solutions. To find a solution we need affirmative action.

Courts moving to Trinidad House…just so

TRINIDAD HOUSE is a likely site for the new Magistrates’ Courts. The Parliament Chamber will probably become a museum, while Whitehall will be turned into an entertainment centre.

Far from reconsidering his decision, Prime Minister Patrick Manning was amplifying on his city centre plans at the post-Cabinet news briefing at Whitehall yesterday. Manning said while Government was still looking at alternative sites for the Magistrates’ Court, (which would be displaced by the new Parliament building), one possible option was  Trinidad House. He said this building, which is itself historic, was “far more adequate to the task” than the current location on St Vincent Street Manning said Trinidad House had its own short street — Treasury Street — which was “easier to embark and disembark prisoners, as opposed to what takes place on the more congested St Vincent Sreet.”

Manning also said it was very likely that Government would turn the Parliament Chamber into a museum and convert Whitehall into an entertainment centre (for government and Prime Ministerial entertainment). The plan for Whitehall would also involve having its staff dressed in clothes reflecting the different periods of the country’s history. While the Parliament Chamber would become a museum, the rest of the Red House was still earmarked for the Office of the Prime Minister, Manning confirmed.

The Prime Minister, who admitted that Speaker of the House of Representatives, Barry Sinanan, was not consulted before Government announced its decision to relocate the Parliament,  said the leader of Government Business  would be speaking with Sinanan when he returns to Trinidad and Tobago. Sinanan, who left Trinidad and Tobago on Carnival Monday, returns today. Manning said Government was listening to all the comments being made on the issue but as of now, it heard nothing to make it reconsider its decision. Manning conceded that the question of the relocation of Parliament was not in the PNM manifesto. Asked why in the face of this, there was no public consultation, Manning reiterated that Government’s plan was in keeping with historical use of the Red House as the seat of governance.

Manning said there was no intention to demolish the Red House or the Magistrates’ Courts. Manning said the problem was not the Parliament, but the chamber which is too small and which cannot be adjusted without destroying its architectural beauty “which would be the real travesty”. On the petition presented by 46 distinguished citizens headed by former First Lady Zalayhar Hassanali, Manning said he had spoken to one of the persons who signed the petition and “after I explained a point of view, the people’s comment to me was ‘I did not realise that when I signed. Perhaps you ought to publicise this more comprehensively and if you do it is entirely possible that you could convince all 50 persons as you have convinced me’. Manning added that he had some of this “in writing”.

Valley said the relocation of the Parliament was not an issue. “In Trinidad we like to look for issues,” he said. He said Cabinet had asked UDeCOTT to come up with a plan and consult with the both Houses of Parliament.  “It is not as though one is going to break down buildings tomorrow and put up an edifice,” he said. Valley said Government might have a particular view but there would be consultation. When asked if this meant that the plan was not cast in concrete, Manning said it was indeed cast in concrete.

CJ: No one speaks for the Judiciary

WITH a possible crisis looming between the Executive and the Judiciary over the relocating of the Port-of-Spain Magistrates’ Court, Chief Justice Sat Sharma said last night that there is no one to speak for the Judiciary.

Sharma said the Attorney General (a political appointee) is the conduit between the Executive and the Judiciary. “But with a conflict of interest looming over this matter, who is really going to stand up for the judiciary in the Cabinet? There is no one to speak for the Judiciary…we stand alone,” the Chief Justice added. Sharma said the announcement by the Prime Minister yesterday that the Port-of-Spain Magistrates’ Court may be relocated to the old Trinidad House building, made the situation worse.

When Dr Lenny Saith first announced that the Government was moving Parliament from the Red House to the block housing the lower courts, he found there was a discourtesy, that no consultation had taken place to inform the Judiciary of the move. “Now, the executive has gone ahead again, and announced that the courts will be moving to Trinidad House. Again….no courtesy, no consultation,” he added. Sharma continued, “If they (the executive) had consulted the Judiciary and disagreed with our comments or recommendations, then the decision is theirs to make. I am aware of the mighty powers of the executive, but there has been no consultation. “They are moving the courts from Point A to Point B…a fait accompli, I have no say, it would seem.”

The Chief Justice added, “I am not central or pivotal to the decision-making process. Where a party is going to be affected by a decision, the party making the decision must consult with that party who is going to be affected. But they have ignored the Chief Justice, who is in charge of the administration of justice.” Sharma agreed that the decision is one for the Government to make, but at least, they had a duty to consult. “It is a fundamental principle in law. I recognise that it is not mine to make, but hear my views, even if you are going to reject them.” Sharma said with this conflict of interest taking place, it has become even more important for the executive to consult with the judiciary over this matter. Sharma said that since the announcement on February 27, no one has consulted or met with him.

Government has spent more than $38 million to refurbish the old Magistrates’ Court building and to erect a new wing for the magistracy. That new wing is yet to be opened as there was a rift between the then Attorney General and the former Chief Justice over this building. Attorney General Glenda Morean-Phillip, during a tour of the new wing last month, indicated that it will be ready for occupation soon. Government will have to spend millions more to refurbish the Trinidad House building to accommodate the courts.