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Fyrish residents protest frequent substandard repairs to major access road
Residents during the protest on Thursday
Concerned residents of Fyrish on the Corentyne came out in their numbers on Thursday to protest the faulty repair works that are being carried out on the Fyrish Road.
They staged a protest in front of the Gibraltar/Courtland Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC) office, citing discrimination by the Regional Administration.
One resident, Megan Lambert, stated that she is fed up with the substandard work that is being done on the road each month.
“Every month the region keeps doing this road, patching here and there and yet it keeps breaking up and they do it again”, she argued.
The residents argued that within one month, the road usually become impassable after which the region would allocate more monies to do more works again.
Lambert also said that she suspects the materials that were supposed to be used to do proper work on the road are being stolen and diverted to other locations because she saw trucks taking materials away from the worksites. She said that she has information that stealing might be occurring.
Also present during the protest was PNCR Councillor, Deborah Hurst, who stated that she represents the issue during every RDC Meeting but only promises are being made.
She added that the road is being repaired for over 16 years now and no repair has lasted more than a few months.
“They are wasting taxpayers’ monies and the monies are going into their pockets!” the councillor said.
Hurst stated, too, that the NDC in the area is being controlled by the Region Seven RDC, hence they cannot “do better”.
Kaieteur News was able to contact Gibraltar- Courtland NDC Chairman, Edwin Mc Bean who expressed solidarity with the protesters. He said that the Ministry of Public Works and Hydraulics does maintenance frequently on the road but it makes no sense since every hour on the hour, the Albion Sugar Estate trucks travel on the road causing severe damages.
“All the region does is that they patch and patch and next year it goes back to the same. The residents want a hot mixture with machine do the road,” the official stated.
The Chairman said that the RDC ends up spending more money in the long run. He also accused the RDC of not informing the local authorities whenever they [the RDC] wants to do work on the roads.
“They don’t share the Bill of Quantities. We just see the contractors come and then we have to enquire who they are. We don’t have control over that, which isn’t good enough. The local authority is supposed to be informed long before it happens, and this is unsatisfactory,” he said. Some of the placards during the protest read, “Fyrish Road is a cash cow for big contractor. Fix today, break one month later. Time out, we had enough” and “Stop paying to full potholes every month!”
Meanwhile, Regional Chairman Zulfikar Mustapha was out of office on Thursday afternoon and efforts to contact DIPCON road services proved futile. (Leon Suseran)
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