Central Govt donates street lights to community bypassed by NA municipality

Residents of Overwinning, Greater New Amsterdam, recently received 28 street lights from Local Government and Regional Development Minister, Nigel Dharamlall.

This was after being told that the municipality had bypassed the community in its street light distribution campaign.
Back in 2019, when the municipality did its lighting programme, residents of Overwinning had spoken out against the discrimination they faced by the New Amsterdam Mayor and Town Council after their community was overlooked. At the time, none of the streets in Overwinning received lights while the neighbouring communities were fully illuminated.
The municipality spent $8 million to install the 956 street lights.
At the last Local Government Elections, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) was able to win that constituency for the first time due to the way the people at Overwinning voted.
However, when the PPP took office in August 2020, a complaint was made to Dharamlall, who promised to assist.
As such, 28 street lights were handed over by Regional Chairman, David Armogan, Regional Vice Chairman, Zamal Hussain and Regional Executive Officer, Narindra Persaud.
According to the Regional Chairman, the regional administration is aware of the reasons why that area was overlooked under the municipality’s street light installation programme.
Meanwhile, the lights will be installed in three cross streets and one main street and the residents will decide where the others should be installed.
“We don’t want to dictate that for you but the Minister has fulfilled the promise that he has made to the people. If you look around, many of our Ministers in the Government including the President have been going around to all of the areas in our country to see how we can be able to better the lives of our people because this is what we presented in our manifesto,” Armogan reminded. (G4)