Five Region Two NDC chairpersons sworn in

Dec 30, 2017 News

The Deputy Region Two Executive Officer, Roop Kumar Persaud, on Thursday swore in five persons to serve as chairpersons within the various Neighbourhood Democratic Councils (NDC), on the Essequibo Coast.

The five elected individuals will be executing their duties as NDC chairpersons in the coming year.

Among those sworn in at the RDC’s boardroom last Thursday were deputy chairpersons of the various NDCs.

The five chairmen pledged to execute their duties with all fairness, and to serve their respective offices to the best of their ability. Region Two consists of five NDCs.

These municipalities all play an integral role towards the development, of individual communities within the region.

According to the NDC chairmen, however, their municipalities are often time overlooked, and seldom are they included in the decision making process.

Commenting further on the issue, one chairman added, “Often times, the RDC will be executing projects within our municipality and we would have no clue as to what’s going on.

Sometimes the projects are half way done, and only then we are made aware that something is happening in the community.”

These chairpersons believe that if the RDC adopts a more consultative approach, then projects can be better monitored in respective municipalities.

DREO, Mr. Roop Kumar, at the swearing in last Thursday, said that the Regional Administration will seek to adopt such an approach in executing future projects.

Kaieteur News understands that poor drainage and infrastructure are issues which, for years, have been plaguing most of NDCs.

NDCs ranging from Good Hope to Evergreen are located in areas which are prone to heavy rice cultivation. Due to the terrain, excessive water from these rice lands would stream into communities during the rainy seasons. This in turn paves the way for major flooding in the communities below.

Community leaders are thus pleading with the RDC, to pay keen attention towards the development of future irrigation systems. The Charity/Urasara NDC, on the other hand, is often flooded due to the over tapping of the Pomeroon River.

Apart from subvention money, these NDCs would rely on rates collection in order to propel development. Some municipalities may find it hard to strive due to poor rates collection.

Sadly, one such municipality is the Evergreen/Paradise NDC. Chairman of this NDC explained, “We can only collect rates from communities which are handed over to the municipality. For the past 15 years however, three communities within our municipality have not been paying their rates. This is because they have not been handed over to the municipality as yet.” A plead was subsequently made to the Ministry of Communities, to address this long standing issue. [Romario Blair]

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