Rohee defends Berbice bridge tolls

PPP General Secretary Clement Rohee has defended the arrangements for the Berbice Bridge tolls, while saying the opposition-led parliamentary motion for their reduction is a “direct intrusion on a private investment” that is aimed at scaring the investors off.

“The Berbice River Bridge is a government/ private sector/international investors project with specific arrangements which were agreed upon. This arrangement is not unique to Guyana and is a norm in other countries,” Rohee said at the party’s weekly press briefing at Freedom House on Monday.

He said that the private investors would have calculated a rate that was appropriate. He added that he did not see the Berbice Bridge Company as a group of “tyrants” that was out to “get as much as they want.”

He warned that if the opposition got its way, there would be severe consequences in future public-private partnership agreements but he did not go into details about what these would be. When questioned by the media on the bridge company’s 12 percent return on investment per annum, Rohee noted that he was not concerned with the financial argument