Dear Editor,
The residents of Cotton Field, Essequibo Coast made several telephone calls to me while I was in Georgetown complaining that a contractor was doing shoddy work on the street leading from the public road to the Anna Regina Multilateral School. This street runs towards the Cotton Field government compound, which accommodates the secondary school, the Ministry of Education, the Guyana School of Agriculture, the National Communication Network and other government agencies.
This would be the sixth time this street is being constructed from 2015 by several local contractors, and it never lasted more than 6 months after construction. This is a main street which motor vehicles would traverse when the public road is cordoned off. The traffic is diverted while the market at Bush Lot is operating from 5 am to 7 pm every Friday so vendors can ply their trade. The cordoning off of this road and the diversion of the traffic had started way back in 1995, after a young man fell in front of a moving truck full of boulders.
Thereafter, the Commander of ‘G’ Division decided with the full support of the council to cordon off the public road between the end of Cotton Field towards the south and the beginning of the Bush Lot market. The council (I was a councillor) met with the Regional Chairman and the Regional Democratic Council to upgrade the back road through the Cotton Field street coming out to the main public road next to my house and business place. We took into consideration that heavy lorries laden with sand, boulders, rice, paddy, stones, cement, etc, would traverse this street on market days. It was therefore properly constructed to accommodate all types of vehicles, and it stood up for years before it started to develop potholes.
The contractor who upgraded this street the first time told me that he was not given the contract to rehabilitate this street subsequently, although he did a good job. He was improperly sidelined and lost the contract although his price was lower than rest of the tenders. He told me that all the roads and streets which are being constructed today are substandard and do not last for six months. This is because of corruption.
I happened to visit this street when I came home from Georgetown, and after inspecting it I could see it would not last 2 months. It is bumpy with a thin layer of tar and sand on top of it. Taxpayers will have to pay through their nose for this substandard street.
I have said before that I opposed the PPP in their corrupt dealings and now I intend to expose all corruption in our region, because this is not what I voted and campaigned for. We need a clean and mean government at all levels, with transparency and accountability.
In Guyana, we fought against corruption for 23 years, but we are being mocked at the regional level by a power-drunk clique. A large number of our contractors have been infected by the examples of what goes on in high places. They want to bring shame on this new coalition government. The government cannot and will not let this continue. I know that the people voted for an end to corruption and fraud.
Yours faithfully,
Mohamed Khan
