The East Port-of-Spain (EPoS) Development Company has described a now rectified spelling error on its newly unveiled Welcome to Morvant Laventille sign as a “learning opportunity,” and the staff responsible for the project are said to be deeply apologetic.
However, EPoS chairman, Hillan Morean expressed disappointment with the public commentary surrounding the incident, as he claimed an EPoS director was attacked on social media over the error.
Shortly after unveiling the sign during a ceremony at the intersection of Lady Young Road and the Eastern Main Road at Morvant Junction on Wednesday, the public noticed that one of the areas was incorrectly spelt. “Arneaud Avenue” was instead spelt “Arneaud Anenue.”
Yesterday, Guardian Media saw a corrected sign with some of the street names rearranged on it.
Morean explained, “I felt it was a mistake that should have been picked up on; internally we got the apologies from our staff about the circumstances and the organisation associated with it. I am treating it internally because we received those apologies internally.”
He added, “We are doing a post-mortem right now, we are taking this as a learning opportunity to ensure that there is a certain level of follow-up before certain projects are executed. Ninety-nine per cent of what we do is project execution, so this is just one of those projects that unfortunately fell through the cracks.”
Morean said correcting the sign did not cost the taxpayers any additional money, as it was done by the supplier free of charge.
The EPoS chairman said he apologised to his board of directors, line ministry, which is the Housing Ministry, and the people of Morvant and environs for the error.
However, he was disappointed with the public’s reaction.
“One of our directors was attacked on social media. A lot of disparaging comments were made about her. And I know people think it’s easy to hide behind a social media persona and attack who they perceive to be someone in some level of authority, but it’s nasty when people do those sorts of things,” Morean said.
He was also disturbed by the comments outside of the spelling error.
“I was more shocked with the type of negative comments people have in their minds for East PoS residents. I saw scores of comments by people that the sign should instead say ‘home of bandits and killers’. And it is sad for me to see that people see residents of East PoS as that when they are much more than that,” he lamented.
Morean wants the public to take note of the work being done by EPoS and not be distracted by the spelling error.
