Tower Gone

Fifty-seven days after telecommunications provider Digicel erected a cell tower in the tiny village of Olive Lodge, Holders Hill, St James, meeting a relentless push-back from residents, the contentious mast has finally been removed – five days ahead of schedule.

And the community, which plans to celebrate victory over the phone company, has suggested its campaign could leverage future dealings with the area MP and his opposition challenger, according to a prominent villager.

A company official who did not want to be identified told Barbados TODAY that the tower will not be relocated “but will just disappear” while the utility seeks to provide coverage for the area by sharing an existing structure with competitor Flow.

“The law says that the cell tower operators must share towers…must…. They cannot stop each other from being on their respective tower,” the official told Barbados TODAY, explaining that Digicel would have to pay rent for its use. “Once they are allowed to locate on the Flow tower, the problem would be solved.”

Digicel has said in previous statements, that the erection of the Cell-on-Wheels tower in Olive Lodge was a necessary temporary measure to properly service some 2 500 residents and 25 businesses. The company had told the residents’ committee that it would be removed on or before March 20.

Olive Lodge spokeswoman Dr Jennifer Obidah-Alleyne said the village’s 70-odd families will have a special celebration, not just for the victory of the tower’s removal, but equally for the “tenacity and strength” shown by villagers in sticking together to fight against its presence.

Residents resisted the installation of the mast and its proximity to the nearest house, claiming that the radiation emanating from the tower posed a cancer risk and other health and environmental problems for them, particularly the many seniors living in the area. 

On Friday afternoon, smiling homeowners watched as the mast was carefully taken down from its perch and driven away on a truck.

Dr Jennifer Obidah-Alleyne and Matrina Gibson rejoicing over the removal of the cell tower.

A resident who had been part of the team spearheading the resistance through constant media interviews, a petition and exchanges with the officials from the government’s Telecommunications Unit and Digicel, was seen running behind the vehicle videotaping it until it left the neighbourhood.

“We are celebrating our togetherness and what we have achieved as a community to make this happen. We will be celebrating with a block party,” Dr Obidah-Alleyne declared. “We are definitely forming a neighbourhood association because, out of this, we realised the significant number of elderly persons that we have in our community. And sitting here right now, I am not even sure how many of them are connected with family that could assist them.”

She said the goal is to ensure that the elderly are taken care of “in this small community”.

“There are three things that we are starting with. One is a group chat with all of the members of the neighbourhood so that if a senior person wanted something…say, they wanted a bottle of gas, it would be in the chat…and somebody would say ‘ok, I will go and get that bottle of gas for them’. So, the group chat is a way to keep us informed about everything that is happening on the block.

“The second thing we are going to do is that we are going to formally apply to be a neighbourhood association. From there, we are going to have quarterly meetings to deal with, for example, major issues emerging in the group chat. We are going to include in the chat MP for the area Kerrie Symmonds and Mr Paul Gibson of the Democratic Labour Party,” Dr Obidah-Alleyne said.

She expressed the hope that Symmonds and Gibson, who she said had already consented to join the chat, could assist Olive Lodge in times of need.

Her advice to other communities was to unite and fight for each other.

“One person might notice something, but one person can’t do it alone. Olive Lodge got a lot of press and we are grateful. We would have been fighting, but without the press bringing it to national attention, we don’t know how successful we would have been. That’s important. But coming together as a community is something that all communities can do, no matter your social status or race.”

The retired UWI professor vowed that Olive Lodge residents intend to continue fighting to make their district a better place in which to live “because there are issues in the neighbourhood that need to be fixed”. 

emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb