Dear Editor,

Happy Acres is a residential community where residents of a certain status, including businessmen and senior government functionaries reside. Houses in this community must conform to certain minimum dimensions and can only be built out of concrete, while each house lot must be 5000 square feet or over.

Over the last few years there has been a proliferation of events which have reduced this community to the squalor of an unregulated squatting area. It is now the grazing pasture for herds of cattle where owners leave their cows unattended every day, and where they graze, destroy and defecate in the entire area.

It is a common occurrence for driveways and entrances to homes to have to be regularly cleaned of cow dung. Pigs and horses are a constant nuisance and damage caused by these animals is very evident. Plants are often shredded by pigs while mating horses have been known to damage vehicles.

The woes of this once beautiful neighbourhood are further exacerbated by the contemptuous disregard exhibited by one family who operate a trucking service, quite oblivious to the welfare of residents and the extensive damage they inflict on our neglected roads. This family has never contributed in any way towards the repair or maintenance of the roads which they damage, and continue to blatantly contravene the conventions of peaceful occupation in Happy Acres.

This has been brought to the attention of the Neighbourhood Democratic Council which has taken no action and has shown no interest in the affairs of our community. All our roads have been left in a state of disrepair while new roads in surrounding areas are being built and existing ones repaired. The neglect and disregard displayed towards us by the NDC leaves much to be desired, and conveys an impression of discriminatory practices.

Yours faithfully,
Maurice Rajkumar

Editor’s note

We are sending a copy of this letter to the Chairman of the Better Hope/LBI Neighbour-hood Democratic Council for any comment he might wish to make.