Finally, after months of what appeared to be indecision, the government has suspended the parking meter project for three months. This is according to an order made by Minister of Communities Ronald Bulkan yesterday, the second such in a matter of a week.
Yesterday’s order removed control over whether Smart City Solutions (SCS) continues to operate in Georgetown or not from City Hall. And to indicate that it was firm the government also ordered the Guyana Police Force to prevent SCS staff from operating in the city. This came after Minister Bulkan’s first order, which directed the Mayor and City Council to suspend the project for three months, was subjected to manipulative obfuscation by Town Clerk Royston King and his cohorts around the horseshoe table on Monday last. At an extraordinary statutory meeting called specifically to deal with the minister’s order, Mr King allowed the tabling of a dubious motion calling time to allow for a legal opinion into the suspension order to be perused. In response to concerns raised by other councillors that the substantive agenda item had not been dealt with, APNU Councillor Oscar Clarke said: “The lawyer advised us and on the basis of the lawyer’s advice, we are saying let us put this thing down until council can study the legal advice. The minister would want to know what the council’s lawyers have advised them.”
This is all well and good, but raises the question as to whether it was the same lawyers who had advised on the veracity of the original parking meter contract, if so then we sincerely doubt that the minister or any right-thinking citizen for that matter would be pleased. We should recall that the original contract was for 49 years with an option for another 49 and that it offered the city just 20 cents on every dollar.
We recall too the words of Mayor Patricia Chase-Green in June last year, “We took a deliberate decision not to share the contract because we wanted to secure the investment. We have had bad experiences with sharing contracts, proposals and initiatives only to have them subtly taken away from the council.” She had also said that the contract which was signed by the Town Clerk was a “private document of the administration.” We believe that government intervention at this point could have derived a much different outcome. With all due respect, Mayor Chase-Green was talking nonsense. As an elected official serving the people of Georgetown, she had no right to conceal the contract. Mr King was also very wrong to sign such a document, which clearly would be burdensome to so many.
It was around this time that the government ordered a review of the contract. A Ministry of Finance Report dated July 2, 2016, had stated that the contract was exploitative in some aspects and that the City Council’s outlook was “ignorant.” It further stated that concessions granted under the contract were “a detriment to the public.”
“Government procurement practices may have been violated, in that a tender was not advertised and bids reviewed for acceptance based on certain criteria and as such justifies a revoking of the contract by government and the re-tendering,” the Finance Ministry had said.
A review done by the Ministry of Legal Affairs around the same time, found that the terms and conditions were onerous. “The concession agreement is one of unequal bargaining strength,” the Legal Affairs Ministry said. “Most of the terms are overwhelmingly in favour of Smart City Solutions Inc with Article 14 on termination being in terrorem of the city.”
It was after the release of the reviews of the contract that SCS, on August 4, 2016 began a series of public consultations targeting stakeholders who live and operate within the central business district of the city, which it said would run until August 25.
Meanwhile, City Hall announced that it would act on government’s advice and an amended contract was subsequently signed. But citizens found the reduced fees and penalties still too burdensome and following the formal launch of the project, a movement arising from social media exchanges began weekly protests. Businesses affected by a lack of customers who refused to pay to park, also joined in along with other groups. But City Hall pressed resolutely ahead, claiming among other things that the revenue it would garner was desperately needed, that the parking project was regularizing traffic in the city, which was far from the truth as the congestion had simply moved to areas where there were no parking meters.
Now that Minister Bulkan has declared the suspension a done deal, the government must say what happens next and what the expected outcome is at the end of the three months. Citizens whose lives are tentatively returning to some normality would like to know.
