…Min. Patterson says PPP had condemned it to scrap

THE former government had considered several options for the future of the MV Torani, including selling the historical vessel as scrap.

This was noted by Minister of Public Infrastructure, David Patterson, who noted in a letter to this newspaper that a directive of the former People’s Progressive Party Government was that the vessel be cannibalised, thus making it unserviceable due to longstanding neglect from the former administration.
Minister Patterson was at the time responding to a letter penned by former Agriculture Minister, Leslie Ramsammy, in the Stabroek New recently, where he noted that it was under the current Government’s control that the MV Torani was “neglected through poor maintenance.”

Patterson said, “this is far from the truth.” In response to Ramsammy’s claims, he said the former minister should note that advertisements dated August 21 and indicating that the ship had sunk were placed in the daily newspapers and were published on Wednesday August 23. In particular, he said mariners were warned to keep clear of the wreck and to navigate with caution.

In addition, Minister Patterson stated that at least two responses were given to members of the media, including one from Minister within the Ministry of Public Infrastructure, Annette Ferguson, even as the Transport and Harbours Department (T&HD) made every effort to investigate the situation. He said too that efforts are being made to drive four piles around the ship to prevent it from slipping into the channel. It currently remains secured by a chain and will soon be salvaged.

“It must be emphasised that the MV Torani served the country and various communities, particularly those in the Berbice River, with distinction for decades,” Patterson said. He noted however, that the state of the MV Torani is not an occurrence “that happened yesterday, or even two or three years ago.”

He said the ship had been moored since November 2012 and left in such a poor state that there was little the current government could do with it. He said that the T&HD turned its attention to servicing and rehabilitating operational ferries, such as the Lady Northcote and MV Kanawan, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. He said this was done since members of the public still needed to have their transport needs met and maintained. “Rehabilitating a long-neglected and decommissioned ship would be even more costly to the people of Guyana,” Patterson said.

He noted that the former PPP Government considered several options for the vessel, including selling it as scrap metal. “It is therefore interesting to hear Mr. Ramsammy, a former Cabinet member of the PPP, extol the virtues and importance of the MV Torani as more than a “trivial and useless heap of steel” when that was how he and his colleagues treated it during their time in power, “Patterson noted.

He questioned where Ramsammy was when the Torani’s service was taken offline resulting in a denial of residents of the Berbice River, a vital link to sell their agricultural produce. In addition, Patterson asked where the former minister’s voice was, when speaking of the legacy of former President, Dr. Cheddi Jagan in the ship-building industry, when the decision was taken to construct the Berbice Bridge at its current location, thus rendering the MV Torani obsolete.

Patterson said the government agrees with Ramsammy, that the MV Torani is a part of Guyana’s history and a national treasure. ”However, we urge Mr. Ramsammy to not be selective when he chooses to care about issues. He does our entire nation a disservice when he finds his voice a little too late” he added.