APNU/AFC’s parking meter saga costs Guyana over US$1M in legal fees – AG

…witnesses identified as Govt to lead evidence in case next July

The legal expenses associated with the parking meter case continues to climb, with Attorney General (AG) Anil Nandlall, revealing it is now over US$1 million as the state prepares to lead evidence in the case.
Back in 2020, the parking meter’s legal challenge was one of the many cases that the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C Government inherited from the former A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Government.
At his end of year press conference on Saturday, the AG confirmed that the Government is preparing to lead evidence in the case, having secured various witnesses, including expert witnesses.
“This matter is ongoing. We have a team of lawyers representing our interest, both in the United States (US) and here in Guyana. The hearings for that matter have been ongoing and in July 2025, we are expected to lead evidence in defense of our claim.”

“Because we are defending, we have been sued for US$100 million at that tribunal. We will be taking witnesses from Guyana and we have also retained the services of expert witnesses in the US, who can speak to these matters,” Nandlall explained.
Nandlall confirmed that one of the witnesses they had identified was former Georgetown Mayor Patricia Chase-Green, though he could not say if she was still scheduled to travel to the US to give testimony. He also confirmed that the price tag of the case, which is over US$1 million and climbing.
“I had given a figure in parliament, of about US$1 million. We would have gone past that now. I don’t have the exact figure but its definitely over US$1 million. We’re now coming to the end of it. But that is the liability that we’ve inherited.”
“And in many, many cases, we’ve been shouldered with that responsibility. The Panama matter is another example. These are creations of the previous Government. But we have to continue to fetch the burden. Because Guyana is one state,” Nandlall added.
The parking meter project to introduce paid parking in busy areas of Georgetown, was implemented under the former APNU/AFC Government without meaningful consultations. The majority of the meters were installed in 2016 but the project was terminated due to widespread protests, leaving them to rot.

Guyanese had protested the parking meters since the proposed fees were deemed “exorbitant.” In fact, the initial proposed fee was $570 per hour which was reduced to $250 per hour and later $150 per hour, with $800 to be charged for eight hours.
The contract would have seen Smart City Solutions (SCS), the company contracted to implement the project, carting off with 80 per cent of the metering profits for close to 50 years. The parking meters were active in January 2017, but this was met with strong resistance from the then PPP/C Opposition, private sector bodies, and ordinary citizens, who formed an organisation called Movement Against Parking Meters (MAPM) – which went on to hold some of the largest non-political protests ever seen in the city.
Amid public pressure, the then APNU/AFC Government finally intervened and suspended the bylaws which paved the way for the implementation of metered parking, thus effectively halting the parking meter project. In the aftermath of the failed project, Guyana was slapped with a US$100 million lawsuit by SCS, for damages and compensation.
The case is ongoing in the US before the Washington DC-based International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID)—an arbitration institution established by the World Bank Group (WBG) to address legal dispute resolution and conciliation between international investors and States.