Dear Editor,
Reading a headline story in the local print media recently regarding plans by the Georgetown Municipality to throw up in the near future two modern malls in our capital city provided me with the joke of the year, the most amusing since 2017 began.
The suggestion by the Mayor and Councillors of the City of Georgetown of all entities in Guyana that they shall not be just putting up one but two malls, and not any conventional shopping complex but two modern, cutting-edge facilities is just simply preposterous.
Are we talking about the same entity that was responsible for making a complete mess of the rehabilitation of the Kitty Market structure? Using inferior materials, massive cost over runs etc. Designing it to be a fully air conditioned then after completing it, deciding not to air condition it, leaving vendors and customers to swelter. Is this the same entity that started the infamous ‘Presidential Park’ that has been left incomplete and hanging in midair?
But aside from those, let us look at the state of their own buildings in which they accommodate themselves. If they are prepared to sit and work in a crumbling City Hall, derelict public health, solid waste buildings and City Police Training Centre, should one believe that they would accommodate vendors and their clientele to modern mall amenities?
Let us look for one minute at the current treatment of vendors, which would give an indication of the level of respect and concern they have for them. The Hairstylists and Cosmetologists are a terrible indicator as they have been dumped on Merriman Mall in sheer squalor under some makeshift tents in most unhygienic conditions. Then there is the Farmer’s Market, rows of stalls on this same mall that are better suited to house animals than humans.
An important question to be asked is whatever happened to the grandiose plans that were unveiled more than a year ago for a modernised design for the Stabroek Wharf that was created by a Kabila Hollingsworth and which featured a two-storied building with a terrace on the top flat and a stelling and boardwalk for boats to dock? Has that been put on the back burner? Or is the Town Clerk just in the habit of making childish promises to the citizenry at the beginning of each new year?
Should the citizens trust the Council whose idea of a mall was the ‘Parliament View Mall, to construct two modern shopping malls in Georgetown? Do the even know what a mall is? An agency that allowed the Stabroek Market Stelling, a priceless heritage site to collapse and has not repaired it since? I think not. But how are they paying for the construction and maintenance of these two modern facilities? With the income from the parking meters? If they are serious then they should leave it to the Private Sector, but then again there would be no kickbacks from the contractors who will be constructing them.
Sincerely,
Nadine Jerrick
