THE Tuesday sitting of the Commission of Enquiry (CoE) into the Paria diving tragedy has been postponed to Wednesday because of what CoE chairman Jerome Lynch, KC, called an upsetting and unacceptable development.

He said Paria submitted important documents that the CoE requested months ago at 4 am on Monday – six hours before the sitting.

He said all the legal teams need more time to read through the "hundreds and hundreds" of pages.

On February 25, Kazim Ali Jr, Fyzal Kurban, Yusuf Henry, Rishi Nagassar and Christopher Boodram – all LMCS employees – were doing maintenance at Berth 6, belonging to Paria Fuel Trading Co Ltd, Pointe-a-Pierre, when they were sucked into the pipeline they were working on. Boodram was the only survivor.

Speaking at Tower D of the Port of Spain International Waterfront Centre on Monday, Lynch said something "problematic" hadhappened that he needed to address.

He said he had to make a decision about preparedness, which includes "having in our possession all the material that we need in order to carry out this enquiry."

He said Paria had been asked months ago for documents and had even been granted more than one extension.

He reminded everyone that the CoE was appointed on April 22, saying it is "inconceivable that those who are responsible for providing material to this enquiry could not have appreciated that this material was likely to be relevant."

He said the first request to Paria was on July 19, noting that the company knew this would be asked of them for three months, but still no documents were provided.

Paria was asked again on September 6 and Lynch said it was "granted standing, so the lawyers, from that date, became involved."

Paria was again asked on November 8 for documents to be submitted by November 11.

"Nothing happened," Lynch said.

On November 11, the company sought an extension until November 17, which was granted. But then on November 15, it sought a further extension, to November 22.

Lynch said nothing was provided on November 22, 23 or 24. Yet again, on November 24, Lynch said, Paria promised to provide the documents the following day, but that did not happen.

On December 4, Paria said it was "putting together ICT records to send by e-mail."

Lynch said Paria was asked a final time last Tuesday and it said the documents would be provided by Friday.

The documents were submitted sporadically between Friday and Monday.

He took out a large stack of papers that he said had been submitted at 4am on Monday and threw it on his desk, calling it a "document dump

"I still don't know if we have it all...This is not acceptable.

"I will not permit our legal team or, indeed, any of the legal teams to have to present their cases half-cocked."

He added that some information needed redacting,as the documents included phone numbers and names.

"It's not right that the other teams should not have this material before principal witnesses from Paria are called."

He apologised to witnesses Paul Yearwood, Randolph Archibald, Osei Flemming-Holder a