Additional $500M still unaccounted for on Durban Park project – Jagdeo

Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo is calling on Government to come clean on the spending on the Durban Park project, since he believes that almost half a billion dollars is yet to be accounted for and this information is deliberately being withheld by the Administration.
Jagdeo made the disclosure on Wednesday last and said “we are still not sure what the final payments for Durban Park are.”
He was at the time addressing members of the local media at a press engagement held at the People’s Progressive Party, Freedom House headquarters.

According to Jagdeo, while Public Infrastructure Minister David Patterson would have made representation for $406 million that was advanced to the project from the Contingency Fund, there has been a deafening silence on large sums collected from the Private Sector for the project.
Jagdeo recalled that in April last, the nation was told that the Durban Park project would only cost $150 million.
This, he said, turned out to be more than $400 million being spent from the national coffers and according to Jagdeo, “we are hearing there are still outstanding bills close to another half a billion dollars.”
As such, the Opposition Leader is calling on Government to make public all of the donations and other monies that would have come in from private interests on the project.
Jagdeo was at the time accusing Government Ministers of not giving straight answers to the National Assembly and by extension the people of Guyana, during the consideration of the advances from the Contingency Fund on Monday last.
“It happened on issues surrounding the Durban Park project,” Jagdeo said. “Even with the Government seeking over $400 million in supplementary provisions to complete that Durban Park project, we are still not sure that those are the final payments.”
Minister Patterson had told the House on Monday last that all 16 of the contractors’ engaged by his Ministry on the project had been paid, but according to Jagdeo, “we are not sure about the finances surrounding that project.”
The Opposition Leader told members of the media “first of all, there have been no answers given about the large sums of money that have been collected from the Private Sector and spent on that project.”
He said, “We do not know how much money was collected from the Private Sector, who gave the money and how it was spent.”
The Opposition Leader recalled that Government’s initial position on the project was that it would be completed at no cost to the treasury but this turned out not to be the case.
“Then we heard it would be $150 million, this turned out to be over $400 million,” he said. Jagdeo posited that Government intentionally sought to hide the reality surrounding the project.
Jagdeo is adamant that among the questions that need to be answered by Government is the totality of monies collected from private donations and who gave the money.
The former Head of State questioned too whether any of the private monies that had been fronted for the project were recorded in the official asset register for the State, in addition to a breakdown of how the money was spent.
He drew reference too, to the announcements from officialdom that there had been public and selective tendering done for the works to be undertaken at Durban Park.
According to Jagdeo, “can you give us the details of when you initiated the process of selective tendering?”
He questioned too whether those contracts that went to public tender had been advertised, and that among the information to be supplied in addition to the successful contractors should be the details in the bids of the unsuccessful contractors.
Jagdeo said Government must also come clean and tell the nation whether all of the liabilities with the project had been made public.