For­mer in­de­pen­dent sen­a­tor Ian Roach says that de­spite the his­toric ap­point­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s first vi­su­al­ly im­paired sen­a­tor, the State still falls short in ad­e­quate­ly ac­com­mo­dat­ing the dis­abled com­mu­ni­ty.

Roach was re­spond­ing to the ap­point­ment of Ali­cia Pauline Lalite-Et­ti­enne, who was sworn in as an In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor on Fri­day.

The wheel­chair-bound at­tor­ney, who served in the 11th Par­lia­ment from 2013 to 2015, wel­comed Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo’s de­ci­sion. He said it shows that peo­ple with vary­ing dis­abil­i­ties can make sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions to na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment.