Broken ceilings
Goa needs only a few heavy showers and gusty winds for alarm bells to ring before houses start to collapse, retaining walls topple over and landslides wreak havoc, disrupting traffic and causing loss of life. While all this can be expected during the monsoon season , how do we explain the collapse of false ceilings in Goa all the year round. Only a few days back there were reports (The Goan Everyday, June 25 - 27) that the false ceiling at the newly- renovated Rajiv Gandhi Kala Mandir at Ponda had collapsed, barely 2 months after renovation. Another false ceiling gave way at several places at the Govt Higher Secondary school at Sanguem. Not long back the false ceiling at the new Dabolim airport teminal collapsed, injuring a few passengers and causing panic at the airport. So what excuse do we have for these collapses, except for poor workmanship and inexperienced and negligent supervision of civil works that are pompously billed as ‘state of the art constructions’. We need to be more vigilant by keeping a strict check on contractors to prevent accidents in future.
A F Nazareth, Porvorim
Racism in UK
One of the ugly fallouts of Britain’s exit from the EU could be a buildup of racism in that country. Britain is home to several immigrants from Europe and across the globe which includes many Asians. During my brief stay in London I was subjected to some racist comments by the Englishmen with whom I was staying. However during the referendum campaign supporters of the ‘leave’ campaign were accused of stoking prejudice against immigrants. As a matter of fact the ‘leave’ campaign message was centered on reducing immigration, which many Britons have probably felt, was reaching ‘breaking point’. It is understood that after the Brexit vote was in favour of UK leaving the EU, several racially motivated posters like “Go Home” and “Leave the EU, no more Polish vermin” have reportedly been seen in West London. The hatred towards migrants and incidents of racism could well be on the rise in the coming days to come in the wake of the Brexit vote. It is for the UK government to see that such sporadic incidents of racism are nipped in the bud and that the immigrants are protected.
Adelmo Fernandes, Vasco
Aap, not tum
The decision taken by the Aam Aadmi Party under Arvind Kejriwal to formulate 40 manifestos for each of the 40 constituencies in Goa is a step that portrays AAP as having the interests of all the people in mind. Meetings are being conducted to decide what the people desire to have on their respective constituencies’ manifesto. Since AAP is taking each constituency into confidence, besides individual constituencies’ problems, this will find a solution to the vexed issue of formulating a Regional Plan by dividing it into forty parts, which in turn will form the whole.
It is not wrong to say that previous governments have not kept their promises and veer from them for their own personal vested interests and thus have ultimately been voted out of office. There is absolutely no doubt that AAP will treat you with respect. Therefore, vote to be treated as aap and not tum.
Elvidio Miranda, Panaji
