Chief Executive Officer of the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GT&T), Major General Retired, Joseph Singh is anticipating a win-win situation when the parent company ATN and the government set the ball rolling in discussions to iron out the differences which have plagued their relationship.
Asked to comment on Saturday about President Jagdeo’s accommodating tone at a commissioning ceremony for GT&T’s US$1.7M mobile and landline facility at the National Stadium, Provi-dence, last week, Singh responded that he had no reason to question the head of state’s sincerity and noted that now a time-line had been set for the discussions, “the company is ready and willing to sit and talk.” At least by May, he asserted, “we should be at the table.”
At the ceremony Singh had said, “I respectfully counsel – let us be imbued with a positive attitude to resolve these legacy issues and the implementation of the ICT strategy in a creative way, so that our joint and collaborative efforts can and will redound to the benefit of Guyana.”
Singh also advocated learning from the lessons of the past and urged a new dispensation which would allow mature and creative partnerships to flourish.
Jagdeo spoke after Singh and in response acknowledged that there were legacy and other issues that the government and GT&T would have to work out, but gave the assurance that these would be dealt with after the CWC event.
“Yes, there are legacy issues and other issues that we will have to sort out, because I feel that a competitive environment brings out the best in people and we have to work towards getting to that environment so that no one becomes complacent in the service to our people,” said Jagdeo
The source of the differences between ATN and the government has been the terms of the 1991 licence and agreement signed with the then Desmond Hoyte administration giving ATN, a US based company, the rights to operate telephone services in Guyana.
(The licence did not cover the operation of cellular services.)
Singh said the two sides hoped to look at the 1991 agreement and the licence in totality, and the government would from its standpoint identify the areas for discussion and point out the ones which they wanted to revisit.
“At the end of it though, we hope it would be a win-win situation and we want the government to be satisfied and the people of Guyana to receive a reliable telephone service.”
At the commissioning ceremony Jagdeo had said that he had nothing personal against Singh or GT&T: “Many times people have that impression because I have been from time to time critical but I just have issues with the company – the issue of providing better services to our people.”
He went on to say, “I want a platform that is stable and competitive enough that would facilitate the development of ICT related services a whole new world of job creation and revenue earning that we are shut out of that has tremendous potential for this country
