Urlings to benefit from modern basketball complex says ‘Shugy’ Simon

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By Neto Baptiste

A full basketball complex equipped with changing rooms, bathrooms and stands will be erected at the site of the dilapidated government-constructed basketball court in Urlings.

This is according to UPP candidate for the St Mary’s South constituency, Kelvin “Shugy” Simon, who said the project could start by the end of the year.

“I have a blueprint for it, finance is already there for it, to refurbish the entire court so this is already drafted. I have somebody willing to finance it because it’s going to cost just a little under a million EC dollars and it’s a major project as you can see with stands, changing rooms, bathrooms and everything, and right in Urlings we are going to put that there,” he said. 

Simon is currently in preparation for a by-election in the constituency, after having resigned as the MP for the area in June this year. He is set to face a former colleague and a former member of his campaign team, Dwayne George, who was recruited by the ruling Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party (ABLP) to contest the by-election.

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Drawings of the proposed basketball complex in Urlings

Simon pointed to a recent Cabinet note suggesting that the government’s plan to upgrade the Bolans playing field as a “political gimmick” by the ABLP.

“It’s a shame that we have a prime minister who thinks he could come in at that last minute and do those things in hopes to win an election over there. People are not stupid. What happened 10 years ago when they were the same government in power with a sitting MP? They didn’t have those plans in place? Every time I put a plan out they try to huff it and make it a part of their plan, but at the same time they are asking me what my plans are so it’s like they want to hear my plans so that they could steal them,” he said. 

He revealed there had been no dialogue with the community or the sporting bodies in the area regarding the promised upgrades to the facility.

“I don’t even know if there is a master plan, all we know is that one morning we got up and saw people start to line out with no consultation. The thing is that where they are putting that stand, the field itself needs to be leveled because right in front of where they are putting that stand they had dumped some mold right where the stand is, so in front there is actually higher than the rest of the field. On the south side is where the water drains and so you can imagine it’s going to be a swimming pool right there if they don’t do something about the gradient of the land, but as I said, all these things come with consultation but they haven’t consulted people who know the area and [are familiar] with what goes on there when it rains,” Simons said.

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Kelvin “Shugy” Simon celebrates with supporters following his triumph at the polls in January

Following his resignation in June, Simon said the legal action launched by the governing party over his eligibility for the position threatened to drag on for at least another year and that he was not prepared to wait that long.

His resignation triggered a by-election. The 42-year-old from Bolans became a first-time MP after January’s general election in which he defeated the ABLP’s Samantha Marshall by almost 200 votes.

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