.jpg)
Greenidge shortly before 21:00 hrs last evening asked that his motion to cut the allocation for the Specialty Hospital be put to a vote, but after objections by Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh and Government Chief Whip Gail Teixeira, citing the fact that the motion did not comply with the Standing Orders, Trotman refused the motion.
This however, cleared the way for the Alliance For Change’s (AFC) proposed cut for the Specialty Hospital to be put to the vote and successfully removed the entire allocation from the 2013 Budget.
The government-led division of votes, saw the House voting 33/32 in favour of the cut.
Prior to the vote, and responding to questions from the opposition benches, Minister of Health Dr Bheri Ramsaran attempted to clarify what he termed as some confusion on the part of the opposition in relation to the different aspects of the project.
Dr Ramsaran provided answers in relation to the works completed thus far, indicating that the contractor hired for the Site Preparation, G Bovell and Sons, had to date been paid some $52.3M for works undertaken, while the contractor for the construction of the Hospital, Surendra Engineering out of India, had already been paid some $746M for its design and survey works undertaken.
APNU’s Annette Ferguson told the House that she had visited the site and spoke to a ‘youngster’ who, according to her, indicated that the works the minister spoke of were not completed.
Dr Ramsaran had indicated that included in the works done thus far would have been the geotechnical surveys and preliminary site preparation.
Ferguson said that based on her inspection of the works, what the minister had reported was inaccurate but, according to Dr Ramsaran, he himself has visited the site on many occasions and can attest to what he reported to the House.
Ferguson claimed also that there were some issues with payment to the local contractor who was awarded the works for site preparation. Dr Ramsaran responded by saying that while he did not want to engage in hearsay, there were some hiccups with the local contractor being able to keep to the deadlines.
The Health Minister informed the House that there was some issue with a lack of capacity on the part of the local contractor to undertake the preparation of the site, but this did not hinder the works of the overseas-based company in its groundwork.
He said the company has completed its initial phase of works for which it has already been paid and, further, is ready to proceed with the project and begin ordering piles and steel structures for the works.
According to Dr Ramsaran, Surendra Engineering has already submitted its preliminary designs for the hospital.
Ramsaran said the geotechnical surveys have been completed and the preliminary designs submitted to the ministry a few days ago
Dr Ramsaran said the work on the part of Surendra has advanced to the point where payment schedules have been submitted for the remaining works
“The design phase is well advanced,” said Dr Ramsaran.
“I would like to make it pellucidly clear that the work has been done by both contractors and this is the result of their efforts…we need to move forward,” appealed Dr Ramsaran.
Dr Ramsaran indicated that the contractor for the construction of the Hospital is ready to proceed with ordering supplies, and he appealed to members in the opposition benches to understand the process.
He said that were the opposition to fail to approve the expenditure then the remaining works cannot follow suit.
Dr Ramsaran sought to impress on the opposition members the importance of adhering to the timelines as set out in the project saying that despite the various pronouncements by ill-informed persons, “we need to sympathetically consider what the $1.2B is aimed at.”
He urged the House to pay attention to the message as against chastising the messenger.
Greenidge, in a push to have his motion to slash the budget voted on, told the House that despite the pronouncements by the minister, the decision was made prior to the consideration of the estimates.
AFC Leader Khemraj Ramjattan in his query, sought to find out from the minister if the successful contractor for the project had undertaken similar such works to which Dr. Ramsaran responded in the affirmative.
The minister reminded that the decision to award the contract to the company was based on an evaluation by the relevant technical personnel.
Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh also attempted to provide members seated in the opposition benches clarification, as there had been misconceptions regarding the difference between the monies being utilised from the local purse as against the loan from India’s Exim (Export/Import) Bank.
Dr Singh informed the House that it must be borne in mind that there are two separate contracts being ventilated.
He said that one of the contracts was awarded to a local company for the site preparation that had to be paid using local resources, while the actual construction of the hospital is being funded through a loan from the Indian Exim Bank.
He said that when the matter was first raised in the House, the opposition had queried why a voted $150M for the project could not have been paid over to the local contractor.
The Finance Minister explained to the House that the $150M at the time was foreign-sourced money for a specified aspect of the project being undertaken by the foreign contractor
He said the loan that was granted by Exim bank is for the construction of the actual hospital, hence the site preparation work had to be done through local funding
“We need to be careful not to confuse the fact we speaking about more than one contracts,” said Dr Singh adding that “there is no mystery surrounding this project.”
The appeals by the government, inclusive of Prime Minister Samuel Hinds, were in vain as the combined Opposition insisted on a vote that saw the monies being gouged from the 2013 allocations, effectively brining the project to a halt with several hundred millions already spent.
