…but City Hall remains in the dark
THE GUYANA Power and Light Inc. (GPL) and the Mayor and City Council (M&CC) of Georgetown issued cheques yesterday in favour of each other in the sum of $179,496,876, in an effort to bring to a close the current disconnection issue.

However, Chief Executive Officer at GPL, Mr. Bharrat Dindyal, told the Chronicle on the telephone that electricity will not be restored to City Hall unless the Council prepares and submits a payment plan for its outstanding amount.

M&CC reportedly still owes GPL approximately $440M, and Dindyal explained that power will be restored only after the Council discloses how it plans to pay the amount outstanding.

Chairman of the Public Utilities Commission (PUC), Justice Prem Persaud, told this newspaper at his office yesterday that the exchange was done at Republic Bank’s main office, Water Street, Georgetown.

According to him, Budget Manager and City Treasurer (Ag), Ms Monica Irving, attended on behalf of the M&CC, while Senior Divisional Director, Mr. Aeshwar Deonarine, attended for GPL.

Persaud said the amount issued yesterday will discharge GPL’s rates and taxes up to and including 2009 ($116,891,749) together with $62,605,127, representing Guyana Electricity Corporation’s (GEC) obligation to M&CC.

He said both parties have agreed to waive any and all interest charges and that the amount does not include rates for GPL’s property at Kingston, Georgetown, on which was built a 20.7 MW power plant.

Persaud noted that the M&CC will in due course invoice GPL for the power plant, which was acquired in 2009.

He further stated that the M&CC’s cheque will partially discharge its obligation for electricity charges owing as at December 2009, and that the M&CC has not yet finalised its payment plan for its outstanding amount to GPL.

Persaud offered that the payment plan was not prepared, likely due to the fact that Deputy Mayor/Chairman of the Finance Committee Mr. Robert Williams is ill in hospital and Town Clerk (Ag) Ms Yonnette Pluck is also unwell.

According to him, GPL has paid over in its entirety what was owed to the Council, but M&CC has paid an amount “to discharge a lot of its obligations.”

GPL and M&CC have been at loggerheads for a number of weeks and electricity has been disconnected from various municipal buildings, including all the departments at City Hall.

GPL had initially claimed that M&CC has been unwilling to reconcile the $600M in electricity bills owed to the Company.

Meanwhile, Mayor Hamilton Green told reporters at his office yesterday that it is his hope that GPL will soon restore electricity to all municipal agencies that have been disconnected.

Green said he pointed out to GPL during discussions that that if the Company is acting as a commercial entity, it ought not to take into count non-financial considerations.

“They apparently did so when they cut off power from some of the Council’s facilities including City Hall which affects the entire function of the municipality and has caused us great pain.”

The Mayor said he found it strange when GPL contended that it would not cut off street lights for security reasons. “We found it strange that they should arbitrarily decide which of our facilities to cut off when street lighting constituted about 60 percent of the amounts GPL claimed we owe them,” he observed.

Green however remarked that during his conversations with the GPL personnel, he found them to be very reasonable and courteous. “But I’m of the view that GPL is very likely operating under directions from elsewhere in its attempt to punish City Hall,” he said.

In an effort to make the municipality more financially viable, Green said he has proposed to convert the Le Repentir dump disposal site into electricity which would require GPL to agree that whatever electricity is being generated could be put into their grid.

He said this proposal was also discussed with a minister in the Government but the M&CC has not received a response to date.

After disconnecting all departments at City Hall and other municipal buildings, GPL last week threatened to disconnect the electricity supply to the Kitty and La Penitence markets had the M&CC failed to honour agreements that were reached between the parties at one of their meetings.

However, according to reports reaching the Chronicle, subsequent to the intervention of the PUC, the disconnections did not take place.