Dear Editor,
The luxury ship -MV City- that has been riding high on the waves of excesses, fraud and mismanagement for the last three years and beyond, seems to have sprung a leak and is now quickly sinking.
There is clearly panic aboard, with the very frightened captain dispensing blame on anyone, anywhere he can, both on the living and the dead, and it is now ‘every man for himself’, with senior officers grabbing every available life jacket and abandoning ship.
Listening to the Commission of Inquiry set up to investigate the goings-on at the Georgetown Municipality, one is left amazed at the ridiculous responses, irrational positions being taken, and the twisted logic being advanced upon by some to defend themselves.
One senior had the temerity to tell the Commission that the rehabilitation work had been done at the City Constabulary Training School to the tune of $47 million, yet he says that the space remains uninhabitable. Now come on, which Constabulary Training School is he talking about? Not the old House Service Department in Water Street? Not even $7 million has been spent there for years, let alone $47 million dollars. I suggest that the Chairman of the Commission and the members of the Local Government Commission pay a visit and thoroughly inspect that facility. It is ruinous, looks abandoned, and is ramshackle. Indeed, it looks like when junkies are finished with a building. The windows, doors, fittings, furniture and just about everything else is gone, even though this place is guarded 24/7. It is leaking badly and is in the worst state that I have ever seen a public building in. I challenge the senior official to produce a detailed expenditure report on the building with accompanying receipts and then and then take building experts to inspect the building to verify the $47 million in work done.
Then you have the Solid Waste Director waking up like Rip Van Winkle arising out of a slumber to declare that City Hall should ditch the garbage contractors and do the waste disposal work itself. Oh please, now that the Council and the Government have frittered away billions upon billions of dollars, this gentleman gets this epiphany of the Council going back to doing what it did for decades- since it had its own animal drawn garbage carts? And then blaming bad management on the administration. Hasn’t this guy been a part of the administration for the past four years?
Then we have the King himself declaring that the City is too broke to tender for goods and services. Well, that’s the icing on the cake! The city is too broke to adhere to a regulatory arrangement that is conducive to transparency, economy, efficiency, openness, fairness and accountability in public sector procurement, but rich enough to award contracts to friends and relatives at grossly inflated prices. Citizens, don’t be fooled.
Best regards,
Sambu Jacobus
