$25,000 shipping fee was in existence for several

Dear Editor,

I fail to understand why the Mayor and City Councillors of Georgetown continue to allow itself to be deliberately misled by the Town Clerk who is really the secretary to the Council.

The Municipal government announced that it took a unanimous decision at their statutory meeting held on Monday, July 11, 2016, for businesses in Guyana’s capital, to pay the City Council $25,000 to have storage devices (shipping containers) parked for 72 hours in front of its business premises and $36,500 for every other day the container is left parked in the public space.

This announcement is clearly intended to deceive the public into believing that this is some new initiative that they have come up with, one which they will implement subsequent to this decision being made. However, the fact of the matter is that the Town Clerk and his forces at City Hall have been collecting this $25,000 fee for several months now by shaking down businesspersons.

Indeed the decision now to have the council approve or should we say rubber stamp this additional tax or financial burden on the struggling business sector only came about as a result of a decision taken by the Private Sector Commission of Guyana to seek legal advice about the legitimacy of council charging this fee.

It is clear that the Town Clerk believes he is the law, and is merely using the council to now provide himself with cover for another of his unreasonable demands on the citizens and businesses in the capital, in order to fund the extravagance of the municipality.

Sincerely,

Mark Roopan