A cheese paste sandwich and a cup of hot chocolate was the first meal hunger-striker Ravi Maharaj was given after he decided to end his five-day protest action against environmentalist Dr Wayne Kublalsingh yesterday. His decision to end the strike came two days after he collapsed outside the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM), St Clair, where he began his protest last Wednesday.
Maharaj, who is warded at the Port-of-Spain General Hospital, is expected to be discharged today.
The 29-year-old Maharaj, who is in favour of the disputed Debe to Mon Desir section of the Solomon Hochoy Highway, had condemned Kublalsingh’s decision to embark on a second hunger strike.
Lying on his hospital bed, Maharaj said he was feeling much better than he was over the weekend. He said he was given intravenous (IV) drips and had also been resting. "My decision to quit was really because of my condition. But now people will look up to me and be inspired," Maharaj said. Maharaj vowed to continue his fight by other means, this time taking it to south Trinidad. “I’m bringing the hunger strike to an end but I intend to take a different action now,” he explained. “I intend to go down to the areas of Debe to Mon Desir and try to highlight and try to bring to the fore the feelings of the people who live in that area and whether or not they do in fact support or oppose the highway and see who is in the majority and the minority.”
Saying his hunger strike had not been in vain, Maharaj said he brought to the public’s attention the benefits of the highway, adding that the people of Debe and Mon Desir had been neglected for far too long. He said he has also shown the true effects that fasting could have on the body. Last Thursday Maharaj, who had complained of exhaustion and dehydration, wrote to Kublalsingh’s former doctor, Asante VanWest-Charles-Le Blanc, seeking treatment.
However, she declined to treat him. In an earlier interview with radio station i95. Maharaj said he believed Kublalsingh was able to complete day 34 of his strike because of the treatment he received from VanWest-Charles-Le Blanc. “I suspect a lot of that had to do with the medical care he was receiving.I though she would be able to assist me in maintaining my body a bit longer than I did. I believe she had some sort of method in maintaining Dr Kublalsingh's body for as long as he had,” Maharaj said. He said he believed VanWest-Charles-Le Blanc only recused herself from attending to Kublalsingh because she believed death was imminent.
Kublalsingh falls ill
But as Maharaj was recuperating, Kublalsingh fell ill. The leader of the Highway Re-Route Movement (HRM) had just pulled up at his camp site outside the OPM when he complained of feeling unwell around 10.30 am yesterday. He was immediately taken back to his home at D’Abadie and up to late yesterday was being kept under close watch by relatives. His wife, Dr Sylvia Moodie-Kublalsingh, who answered his cellphone yesterday, said she was worried about her husband’s condition. “He’s just getting weaker and weaker, and critically, he couldn’t even come out the car this morning (yesterday) and he asked to be taken back home. That in itself is significant, and I think that is cause for concern. “I am just hoping for the best,” Moodie-Kublalsingh said.
Asked if Kublalsingh would be taken to hospital, she said that was still undecided.