Residents upset over chopping of Samaan tree, 'illegal' temple

Renuka Singh
Sunday, May 24th 2009
http://www.trinidadexpress.com/index.pl/article_news?id=161481371

Irate Aranjuez residents are upset over what they claim is a display of political high handedness perpetrated by the Hindu group SWAHA to not only illegally build a temple in a playground in the area but also move to have a Samaan tree chopped down.

Residents came out onto the Coronation Street playground yesterday and angry words flew between them and the employees of the contractors called in to destroy the tree, Cascadoux Enterprises.

Residents said the tree was an Aranjuez landmark, and that the temple built on the site was an illegal structure while the workmen said they were contracted by the Ministry of Agriculture to cut down the tree "weeks ago" as the sagging branches posed a hazard to the temple. However, Councillor Nazimool Mohammed said the San Juan/Laventille Regional Corporation had no prior knowledge of the tree-cutting exercise. He is questioning the legality of the exercise. "That tree falls under the jurisdiction of the Regional Corporation. To the best of my knowledge, the corporation did not know about the tree cutting," he said in a telephone interview yesterday. Mohammed said he contacted the Chief Executive Officer of the Corporation who was also unaware of any requests to cut down the tree and that the Ministry of Agriculture never contacted them to discuss the chopping down of the Samaan tree. "I spend a lot of time in the office and I never miss a meeting so I would know if that request came in," he said. He also noted that the small park on which the Samaan tree stood was the property of the San Juan/Laventille Regional Corporation and that no permission was ever given to anyone to build a temple there. Mohammed also noted that Samaan trees are protected by laws in T&T and cannot be chopped down unless permission is given by the Ministry of Agriculture. Aranjuez resident Bharath Rampersad said early yesterday morning police officers were directing traffic away from the small park area and that when he inquired as to what was going on he was told that a tree trimming exercise was about to be carried out. By mid-afternoon half the tree was already chopped down. "The key issue is that the villagers did not know what was going on. No one told us what they were doing," he said. The residents say the tree is over 184 years old and deserved to be protected as a landmark.