Foreign Affairs Minister Carl Greenidge has disclosed that the Guyana Government is unsure of what will become of the monies committed for the Specialty Hospital Project, which has been mired in controversy since its initial stage.
The Minister told reporters on Thursday that back in September, he had met with India’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and a commitment was given to engage Guyana on the matter.
“What I had asked was that consideration be given to facilitating the funding to enable us to conclude that hospital… The question of what exactly happens to the money that has been committed to this particular Project is still the subject of discussions between us,” the Foreign Affairs Minister explained.
This comes in light of the fact that the A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Administration is uncertain whether it will move ahead with the Project using a new contractor or have it scrapped entirely, given all the troubles it has faced.
Back in June, Minister of State, Joseph Harmon had disclosed that the Indian Government, who is funding the Project via a US million Line of Credit, had indicated that it was ceasing worldwide business with Fedders Lloyd Corporation Limited, which was handpicked by the coalition Government, after the company was blacklisted by the World Bank until 2020 over fraud and corruption practices.
The donor country had also expressed preference for a fresh tendering process to be conducted to select a new India-based contractor to execute the Project. However, at the time, the Guyana Government said that it wanted to make certain enquiries of the Indian Government before a definitive course of action was adopted on the Specialty Hospital Project, located at Liliendaal, Greater Georgetown.
Public Health Minister, Dr George Norton subsequently told this newspaper that the Project has been “shelved”. He had previously explained that the Foreign Affairs Minister was supposed to make contact with India on the enquiries.
But according to Minister Greenidge on Thursday, he “can’t give an answer”, as he had raised it with the Indian Junior Minister within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and he promised to look at it”.
Moreover, the Foreign Affairs Minister took the opportunity to address claims that scrapping the Project would result in a loss to Guyana. He stated that the Hospital was not a facility to provide service to Guyana, but to attract “health tourism”.
This facility, he said, will be run by Indian doctors and nurses to provide services to Americans and others who have health insurance and whose health insurance providers would prefer a lower cost of service than what exists in their nation.
Foreign Affairs Minister Carl Greenidge
“It was not a hospital constructed to deliver services to Guyana… Therefore, to suggest it was a loss of service to Guyana is nonsense. If there is any loss, it’s a potential maybe income loss, but I’ve never seen a document that shows how profits from such an enterprise would be shared between the Government of Guyana and the sponsors,” Greenidge remarked.
In 2012, the contract for the Specialty Hospital was awarded to India-based company Surendra Engineering Corporation Limited; however, citing instances of alleged fraud and delays, the Donald Ramotar Administration in 2014 announced that it had terminated the contract of the company and subsequently filed a lawsuit against it for failing to honour its obligations. Guyana is yet to recover close to $1 billion from the company. While in Opposition, both APNU and the AFC had strongly opposed the US$18 million Specialty Hospital Project and upon assumption to office last year, decided to scrap the Project, which had already expended some US$4 million on certain preliminary works. The new Government had said that the remaining $13.8 million would be better served if it was used to improve the country’s primary healthcare service by upgrading three hospitals across the country.
However, the Indian Government subsequently indicated that Guyana should go ahead with the Specialty Hospital and it would provide a separate loan for the primary healthcare project. The process is currently ongoing for Government to acquire the second loan, Greenidge disclosed on Thursday.
