CHINA Harbour Engineering Company Limited (CHEC) has been negligent in conducting its operations according to local and international standards.Minister within the Ministry of Social Protection, Simona Broomes, said investigations done by the Labour Department of the Ministry of Social Protection has determined the foregoing, and has confirmed there is “complete negligence” on the part of CHEC.

The minister made this disclosure as she responded to questions on the operation of the CHEC with respect to occupational health and safety matters.

Broomes further disclosed that the CHEC is on the ministry’s agenda. She said the company has been asked to submit a list of workers and, more importantly, a list of Guyanese nationals working with the Chinese company on the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) Expansion project at Timehri.

Contractually, CHEC is required “to use nationals and make sure the proportion of the Chinese labour and local nationals will not be less than 6:4”, except where technical skills are concerned.

Questions recently surfaced following an incident at the company’s Timehri site, where one of its engineers — Liu Li of China – died, while Zhang Yixun, another engineer, was injured at the site of the CJIA expansion project at Timehri, EBD. The 23-year-old Li was doing soil testing in Timehri when he and Yixun were trapped beneath a quantity of soil that caved in on them.

Public Infrastructure Minister David Patterson has requested that an immediate investigation be launched into the September 17 incident, which saw many persons speaking out about the alleged lack of proper safety measures being employed by the company.

“No risk assessment was done,” said Minister Broomes, who also said that her ministry has an ongoing investigation into the general operation of the company. “It is a nightmare,” said Broomes who believes that foreign companies need to make good on their contractual obligations while taking safety precautions seriously. “We have an investigation going on the general operations and industrial relations aspect (of the company’s operations).”

Monday afternoon’s attempts to contact CHEC’s local manager, Kevin Lieu, on safety measures employed by the company proved futile. The Guyana Chronicle has been reliably informed that the Chinese company has not been taking safety precautions seriously, and many of its workers are consequently inadequately equipped with safety materials such as safety vests, shoes and the like.

This publication understands that the CHEC contract, signed under the former administration, includes the provision of two Health and Safety engineers on site for the duration of the project; one must be employed by CHEC and the other by the Ministry of Public Infrastructure.

CHEC, in 2011, signed a deal with the previous administration for the extension of the CJIA, which saw China’s Exim Bank funding the project to the tune of US$138 million.