Enhancement workers to be employed in Region 9

The Local Government and Regional Development Ministry plans to employ Community Enhancement Workers (CEWs) across several Region Nine (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo) villages to preserve and enhance their respective infrastructural aesthetics. This announcement was made by Nigel Dharamlall, the Department of Public Information reported, during an outreach to the region last week. The Minister, the report stated, said at least five CEWs will be employed under the Community Infrastructure Improvement Project (CIIP) in 2021.
“My Ministry, almost immediately, will employ five enhancement workers in the communities where we will pay them as soon as they are selected from the relevant stakeholders to start working. Moving forward, we intend to increase the number of employees,” he said.
The initiative will not only create jobs which will boost villages and regional economies, but also preserve aesthetics that will benefit tourism. Villages such as Yupukari, Awaruwaunau, Fairview, and Massara are among those expected to benefit.
Dharamlall told residents this initiative is among several plans his Ministry has to help transform the region in every sector.
“We want to do much more for our people and so despite the Government approving the National 2020 Budget; it is just an emergency budget which does not allow us to do what needs to be done now,” the Minister is quoted by DPI as saying.
CIIP started in 2014 and was modified in 2015 to decentralise resources to the local democratic organs. This remodelling has seen the day-to-day management of the workers transferred from the Ministry to the local democratic areas via the Community Enhancement Initiative, which falls under the CIIP.
The CIIP also enables the Neighbourhood Democratic Councils to provide services to the communities and to encourage citizens to pay their rates and taxes to facilitate maintenance of crucial structures and other development works.