TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO-POPULATION: Fighting the Problem of Vagrancy

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Wesley Gibbings

PORT OF SPAIN, Oct 21 1997 (IPS) - Renowned Trinidad singer/composer David Rudder once chose to immortalise the street dance of a Port of Spain dweller by using footage of the man’s fancy steps in his music video for the Caribbean hit “Chant of a Mad Man.”

This vagrant will, however, sign no autographs if you come upon him along the Brian Lara Promenade in downtown Port of Spain. Unless, of course, there is a packet of cigarettes or lunch involved.

Rudder’s “mad man” is one of hundreds of men, women and children living on the streets of the city. But debate is raging here about whether that number is increasing or declining.

Last year, the minister of social development, Manohar Ramsaran estimated there were about 600 vagrants in Port of Spain. The latest count by the leading Non Governmental Organisation (NGO), the St. Vincent de Paul Society, dealing with the problem is that there are about 250.

Business operators in downtown Port of Spain are quick to dismiss claims of any reduction in vagrant numbers. Helen Drayton, a senior bank official, quips: “The entire capital seems to be known by vagrants as a place to gravitate to.”

Well, say others, not quite. The now bustling central Trinidad borough of Chaguanas has become a popular destination for vagrants and local government officials there are caught in a quandary between a humane approach and cries from some quarters to use more forceful means.

The city of San Fernando is also having its share of problems. There are at least 100 homeless persons in the hilly southern district. The eastern borough of Arima is also reporting an increase in vagrant numbers.

The St Vincent de Paul Society, an NGO closely linked to the Roman Catholic Church, has been leading the battle in Port of Spain. A facility operated by the Society in the capital city currently houses 170 displaced persons and the government is donating another 50 beds to expand the service.

“The number of them (vagrants) in the capital far exceeds what we can accommodate,” facility manager Joseph Meharris says sadly. “We’re almost always full.”

A survey of street dwellers revealed that there are about 27 women who eat, sleep and wash themselves in the city parks — popular haunts for vagrants. Some have been diagnosed as being mentally ill and several are suspected to be suffering from the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

Steve Solomon, long-standing St Vincent de Paul activist and head of the organisation says it is difficult to tell for certain but that “we’ve had two or three women come to the centre and die from AIDS.”

“We don’t turn these people away. We don’t turn anyone away, even if they have AIDS or are mentally ill.”

Meharris believes that between 20 and 25 percent of people attending the centre are HIV positive and another 20 percent have prison records. “They won’t able to find jobs after prison so they went on the streets,” he says.

More than 11 years since the pledge of the former National Alliance for Reconstruction (NAR) administration to deal summarily with vagrancy within one year, yet another government is trying its hand at the problem.

But more than a year after discovery of a pornography ring involving street children and an undertaking to devote more resources toward a resolution of the problem the Basdeo Panday administration has only recently ratified plans for what is being called a Social Displacement Unit in the Ministry of Social Development.

“Before, all we had was a lot of old talk, not even a desk was in place,” says Ramsaran. One of the first official acts of the NAR administration of 1987-1991 was the convening of a Task Force on Mentally Ill and Homeless Persons.

The People’s National Movement (PNM) administration had its own jab at the situation between 1991 and 1995, but little progress was made. Then came the Ramsaran Plan.

The Ramsaran Plan, named after the social development minister, unveiled more than a year ago, envisages a menu of options that takes into account the multi-dimensional nature of the problem. It also prescribes different courses of action to deal with the different categories of homeless persons.

The “Caura Plan” — which proposed to house much of the vagrant population in the resort-like facility at the foot of the island’s Northern Range — was first scrapped then taken up again, at least partially.

Caura was the name of a former hospital facility.

The plan now is to house only the drug addicts among the vagrant population at the Caura building. “The nation-wide project by the new Social Displacement Unit will see us needing more beds to expand their accommodation,” Ramsaran says.

A 10 year old study revealed that no fewer than 86 percent of all vagrants were male and that about seven percent had been married. Researchers found that domestic conflict accounted for 46 percent; alcoholism one percent; illness two percent; loss of home 28 percent; loss of parent three percent; loss of job six percent and other unexplained reasons 13 percent.

The 1986-1991 NAR administration had trained 30 police officers and mental health officers to deal with the challenge. In the process, close to 125 persons were taken off the streets after two years of trial and error by officialdom.