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alexk
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The Galleons Passage is expected to begin servicing the seabridge soon.
However, when it makes its maiden voyage to Tobago, all passengers will have to pay for the trip as there will be no free rides.
Confirmation came yesterday from Works and Transports Minister Rohan Sinanan, as he gave an update into the progress schedule of the US$17.4 million vessel which docked on our shores on July 16 after a long journey from China.
Sinanan said a T&T flag was finally installed on the vessel last Friday. The vessel arrived with a flag of convenience from Vanuatu, which is a small island in the Pacific.
“That is one part of the process that has been completed. We are now finalising the process with the Maritime Division and Lloyd’s Register broker and we are hoping that shortly we would have the vessel in place,” Sinanan said.
Asked to give a more specific time frame on the vessel’s actual servicing of the seabridge, Sinanan could not say.
“I can’t give you a date because the process is ongoing. It’s a procedure that has to happen. We expect within the shortest possible time.”
However, Sinanan said it was unfortunate that people have been constantly posting misinformation about the vessel while it was they were trying to finalise things for it to service the inter-island seabridge.
Last week, reports surfaced on social media that vessel had been leaking oil into the sea where it is docked off the Port Authority of T&T jetty, which Sinanan rubbished.
“People have just been putting false information in the public domain just to panic the population,” he said.
Questioned about when modification work on the vessel will begin, Sinanan noted that while some of the boat’s retrofitting had been completed in Cuba, the remaining works will be done by the National Infrastructure Development Company (Nidco), under whose purview the boat falls.
Last month, president of the Transport Division of the Tobago Chamber Diane Hadad had proposed that in an effort to return confidence on the seabridge, Government should give consideration to “having the first couple of sailings free” as a gift to the people.
Following Hadad’s proposal, Nidco chairman Herbert George said they had toyed with the idea of sailing the Galleons Passage free of charge to Tobago.
Sinanan, however, shared a different view.
“That is not being considered. What Nidco and the Port Authority are working on is to give the population that whole confidence of using the seabridge. And I don’t think that free sailing had anything to do with that. The thought of a free sailing is not being considered.”
He said what made this possibility even further off was the fact that ferry tickets are already heavily subsidised by the Government.
“What we have to work on is the availability and reliability of the vessel, it’s not on free sailings,” Sinanan added.