Housing Development Corporation (HDC) workers ignored insults and threats as they tore down windows and doors at an apartment complex at Independence Square, Port of Spain under guard by a contingent of over 50 police officers on Saturday.
The action follows a last-ditch attempt by some tenants on Friday to get the HDC to delay the demolition of the apartments.
From around 8 am, van loads of police officers arrived at the site as HDC workers, accompanied by the corporation's head of security Sterling Hackshaw, moved in to evict the tenants and other dwellers.
[caption id="attachment_1004086" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Tenant Colleen Mendoza hurls abuses to HDC officials as workmen began to demolish apartments at Independence Square, Port of Spain on Saturday. - ROGER JACOB[/caption]
HDC workers, wearing balaclavas, were seen throwing empty plastic food containers out the window, dismantling doors and windows and piling them on waiting trucks.
At one point, the workers found what appeared to be a bottle of alcohol and placed on the window sill but in a blink it was gone.
The workers removed everything from the apartments – barrels of clothing, boxes of dishes, TVs, closets and bed frames. One resident was seen removing some of her own stuff which included a wheelchair.
When workers could not remove the windows with power drills, they resorted to breaking them with hammers. Newsday heard glass shattering as the news team went closer to the apartments.
One tenant Colleen Mendoza shouted at Hackshaw telling him, “This is will come back for you.”
“If they (officers) take me out, I grabbing you.”
While speaking to Sunday Newsday, she said she just couldn’t understand why there were so many armed officers present.
“People here, we have nothing, no gun, fighting, shooting or killing, we living quiet. You never hear about the people in Independence Square and how much police they have here.”
[caption id="attachment_1004087" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Police officers stand ready to assist HDC workers as they removed doors and windows from Independence Square, Port of Spain apartments on Saturday. - ROGER JACOB[/caption]
She also claimed that officers manhandled a woman while trying to get her out of the apartment but she didn’t give any more details.
Every time Mendoza walked close to Hackshaw he would step aside where he was blocked by police officers or other workers.
Another tenant Michelle Le Maitre said she received her keys for another apartment in Charford Court, Port of Spain, but couldn’t move in since there repairs had to be done after a water leak damaged it.
“When they gave me a key, they said my day to move was the third (of March) to move in, but the apartment wasn’t finished." She said she had gotten a two-week extension to stay at the Independence Square apartment from an HDC official whom she named.
Le Maitre said she began repairs instead of waiting on HDC. She said on March 2, Hackshaw and two HDC workers visited the apartment complex and told the tenants that
