PM Pledges Special Needs Centre for Tobago

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has pledged to es­tab­lish a cen­tre in To­ba­go to sup­port chil­dren with spe­cial needs, not­ing that as a grand­moth­er to a child with autism, she un­der­stands the chal­lenges in­volved.

Dur­ing her first of­fi­cial vis­it to To­ba­go since win­ning the April 28 elec­tion, Per­sad-Bisses­sar be­gan her ac­tiv­i­ties ad­dress­ing stu­dents from Sig­nal Hill and West­ern ar­eas of the is­land at the Sig­nal Hill Sec­ondary School.

On her ar­rival, Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­ceived an over­whelm­ing­ly pos­i­tive re­cep­tion from the stu­dents, many of whom would have rushed to in­ter­act with the Prime Min­is­ter.

Dur­ing her speech to the stu­dents, the Prime Min­is­ter recog­nised the pres­ence of the Hap­py Haven School, a spe­cial ed­u­ca­tion in­sti­tu­tion in Sig­nal Hill.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said their pres­ence served as a re­minder of what true courage is, and she pledged fur­ther sup­port for chil­dren with spe­cial needs through the es­tab­lish­ment of a cen­tre for dif­fer­ent­ly-abled chil­dren.

“Dur­ing my first term as Prime Min­is­ter, we es­tab­lished some­thing called the Na­tion­al En­rich­ment Cen­tre for chil­dren with spe­cial needs. It was the first of five plans across the na­tion, in­clud­ing one planned for To­ba­go. Let us work to­geth­er and get that spe­cial needs cen­tre al­so done here in To­ba­go.

In Trinidad, there is a Na­tion­al Ther­a­peu­tic and Re­source Cen­tre for Per­sons with Dis­abil­i­ties (for­mer­ly the Na­tion­al En­rich­ment Cen­tre). Lo­cat­ed in Carlsen Field, Ch­agua­nas, it is a fa­cil­i­ty un­der the re­mit of the Dis­abil­i­ty Af­fairs Unit of the Min­istry of the Peo­ple, So­cial De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Ser­vices. Its pri­ma­ry role is to pro­vide re­ha­bil­i­ta­tive and ther­a­peu­tic ser­vices for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties.

Lament­ing the state of the cen­tre in Trinidad, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, “It was left to de­cline af­ter we went out of of­fice. But I pledge that this vi­sion is be­ing re­newed be­cause not one sin­gle child must be left be­hind.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the wel­fare of chil­dren with spe­cial needs is a mat­ter close to her heart.

“Be­cause you may know, some of you, I am the grand­moth­er of a child on the autism spec­trum and have seen first-hand that every child car­ries a unique light. Our du­ty is to en­sure that light is nev­er dim, on­ly nur­tured.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar al­so gave out toys to the stu­dents of the Hap­py Haven school.

To the oth­er stu­dents in at­ten­dance, the Prime Min­is­ter as­sured them that her gov­ern­ment will cre­ate a fu­ture where there will be mean­ing­ful em­ploy­ment op­por­tu­ni­ties in To­ba­go.

“So, un­der my ad­min­is­tra­tion, you To­ba­go young peo­ple will no longer need to leave home your home here in To­ba­go, be­cause you will find op­por­tu­ni­ties be­ing cre­at­ed for you. These can build your dreams right here on this beau­ti­ful is­land.”

Dur­ing her school vis­it, the Prime Min­is­ter was al­so pre­sent­ed with a por­trait of her­self done by To­ba­go artist Shonari Richard­son.