Freedom Fm has been reliably informed that a report on the recent scientific tests conducted at the Basseterre High School campus by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) were inconclusive.
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education Hon. Shawn Richards announced during Tuesday’s parliamentary sitting that a meeting was scheduled for Wednesday morning to review and discuss the contents of the NIOSH report.
Stakeholders which include the St. Kitts Teachers Union, BHS management and Parent Teacher Association (PTA) had not been privy to the results of the investigative tests done by the CDC agency, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health although the government received the report a month ago.
It has been disclosed that similar to the report from the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) in 2014, NIOSH was unable to pin point a specific cause for a series of like health symptoms experienced by staff and students of the BHS for more than three years.
Although Senator Wendy Phipps revealed during the Prime Minister’s monthly press conference that the NIOSH results were missing soil testing and that the government would have to ascertain why the critical area was omitted, it has been reported that questioned whether plans they were given to work with captured accurately the location of all underground septic.
Members of the opposition have called on the government to make the NIOSH report public. There has been speculation that the government may have with held the report because the report not what they had expected. Hon Marcella Liburd SKNLP chair and parliamentary constituency 2 representative speaking to Freedom Fm on Thursday noted her displeasure with the fact that the parliamentary opposition had yet to see the report. She again called for transparency in regard to the BHS.
The BHS was sharing the Washington Archibald High School campus in a shift arrangement from the last half of the school year. The Education Minister, however maintains that the government is committed to ending the shift system by finding a temporary location for classes. The government has also committed to building a new Basseterre High.
Mean time an investigator of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) is investigating the breaking and entering, and vandalism of rooms at the Basseterre High School sometime between 4:00 p.m. on Friday 31st July and 1:20 p.m on Sunday 2nd August 2015.
Initial investigations revealed that a joiner who works at the Woodwork Shop at the school was on his way to the Woodwork shop on Sunday 2 August when he observed a door to the Western Office open. The building was checked by the joiner and he observed that the office was vandalized with the dry chemical from a multipurpose fire extinguisher and Paint splatter on everything inside the offices including the Photocopy machines, computers and student files. The entire compound was checked and a number of classrooms and the Guidance Counseling Department were observed open with the stench of marijuana and rum bottles inside. Investigations into this matter continue.
Anyone who has information pertaining to this incident is asked to contact the CID at 465-2241; ext. 220, 230, or 231, the nearest police station, or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-8477 (TIPS). Remember, you do not have to provide your personal information, and you may be eligible to receive a reward.