HGP Nightly News – Former Transport and Harbours Department captain Andrew Donald has blamed the agency’s management and the ministers responsible for its operations for the conditions preceding the MV Barima tragedy.
Donald, who said he commanded the vessel during his 12 years at T&HD, described it as “a floating disaster waiting to occur” and argued that the three men charged with murder are being used as scapegoats.
“I blame T&HD and its subject ministers,” he declared Tuesday.
Captain Kevin Price, Chief Mate Rondell Dwayne Roberts and Goods Superintendent Delon Granderson have been charged with murder and remanded to prison.
They are presumed innocent unless the prosecution proves the charges beyond a reasonable doubt.
Donald questioned why responsibility appeared to stop with the people aboard the ferry and at the wharf while senior managers and government officials remained outside the criminal case.
He alleged that captains routinely faced pressure from wharf employees, business owners and T&HD managers over how much cargo vessels accepted and when they departed.
Management asserted control when operations were proceeding normally but withdrew when problems arose, he claimed.
Donald recalled ordering the MV Barima’s cargo hold closed and secured to prevent workers from loading additional freight.
Even then, he said, telephone calls would follow from people seeking to have more cargo accepted.
He alleged that captains faced attempted bribes and threats of transfer, suspension or dismissal when they resisted.
Those claims have not been independently verified, and Donald did not identify the individuals allegedly responsible. The Commission of Inquiry will have to test his account against T&HD records, communications and testimony from other employees.
According to Donald, the vessel could carry only a limited combination of passengers and cargo before moving outside its safety parameters.
“Every voyage was a never-ending war with management,” he wrote.
His account raises questions about who exercised practical control over loading.
Government officials previously said the loading superintendent managed activity on the waterfront, while the captain and chief mate retained final authority to reject passengers or cargo.
Donald’s allegations suggest that a captain’s formal authority may have been undermined by institutional and commercial pressure.
The former captain also raised serious concerns about the ferry’s construction and ability to survive flooding.
He described the MV Barima as a single-hull passenger vessel and alleged that it operated contrary to standards contained in the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea.
Whether those specific international requirements applied to the vessel and whether it complied with the relevant domestic rules remain matters for technical and legal determination.
Donald said the ferry lacked hull tanks capable of containing incoming water and did not have an operational bilge system powerful enough to control serious flooding.
In the event of an underwater breach, he claimed, the crew might have had only five to 10 minutes to activate emergency procedures.
“The Barima was not supposed to be in service,” he wrote.
Public Works Minister Juan Edghill has maintained that no inspection report declared the vessel unseaworthy. He said it was last dry-docked in 2024 and was scheduled for its next planned docking during the second half of 2026.
Donald dismissed the focus on whether maintenance or dry docking was overdue, arguing that the vessel’s problems were more fundamental than its repair schedule.
He called for public examination of its safety certificates, inspection history, loading records, dry-docking schedule, passenger and cargo limits, freeboard and draft.
The qualifications and experience of the assigned crew, passage plan and condition of the emergency equipment should also be scrutinised, he said.
Donald asked whether management authorised excess cargo and whether the captain received a completed cargo plan before loading.
He also questioned why a distress message was not transmitted through available shore-based systems and why, in his view, a more senior captain and crew were not assigned to the vessel.
His criticism followed the disclosure that two crew members, including the captain, tested positive for narcotics after being rescued. A positive test does not establish impairment at the time of the capsizing or prove that drug use contributed to the disaster.
Donald said public attention had moved from those test results to murder charges without sufficiently examining the role of management.
The Director of Public Prosecutions has said the charges followed a review of the police file, applicable law and judicial authorities. The DPP maintains that the criminal case and Commission of Inquiry can proceed simultaneously.
Donald said he would await the inquiry’s conclusions and expressed confidence in the maritime-accident expertise represented on the international panel.
He nevertheless insisted that Price, Roberts and Granderson “do not deserve to be treated like this.”
Donald said he hoped “good judgement will prevail” and that investigators would eventually turn their attention to the other officials and institutions involved in deciding how the MV Barima was loaded, maintained and kept in service.
