By Svetlana Marshall

HAVING inherited a broken local government system at the level of the Interim Management Committee (IMC), Team Integrity is promising the residents of Bartica greater transparency as its members call on the masses to throw their support behind the party at the upcoming Local Government Elections.

Come March 18, Team Integrity will be contesting the Local Government Elections in all nine constituencies in the emerging town of Bartica, Region Seven. Under the umbrella of the APNU+AFC coalition, Team Integrity will be contesting in both components of the elections: First-Past-the-Post and Proportional Representation (PR).

Ms Kamal Persaud, Team Integrity’s Deputy Mayoral Candidate, in an interview with Guyana Chronicle on Friday, said the Bartica Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC) was, under the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C), reduced to an Interim Management Committee (IMC) that was poorly managed, to the detriment of residents. Currently Deputy Chairperson of the Bartica IMC, Ms Persaud said that upon entering office approximately four months ago, the new committee, headed by IMC Chairman Gifford Marshall, was faced with a debt of more than $9M — the accumulation of a $9M lawsuit won by a citizen, and an outstanding debt of close to $1M owed to the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) for electricity supplied to the NDC Office, the Bartica Municipal Market and the Abattoir.

The National Insurance Scheme (NIS) had also sent the IMC a letter indicating that some $906,553 in contributions were outstanding; and the situation was further compounded with the discovery that a mere $147,000 had been left in the Market and General Accounts of the IMC.

Though it continues to be a challenge, Ms Persaud said, the IMC has been reducing its financial burdens “one step at a time”.

Moving ahead, the APNU+AFC candidate said the residents of Bartica can continue to expect, at the level of the IMC, the high levels of integrity and transparency which the coalition representatives are currently displaying.

TIME FOR CHANGE
“Residents are tired of the old system. Persons get into office and they do as they like; there is no accountability, no respect for taxpayers, and in some cases they can’t even ask how their monies are being spent. But this will not be the case once we are voted into office,” Ms Persaud assured. She noted that APNU+AFC will remain accountable to the people of Bartica, and by extension the rest of Guyana.

Team Integrity, it was pointed out, comprises a group of individuals who have long been championing the need for the issues affecting Bartica to be addressed.

“We are a team comprising persons of different aspects of life. One thing that is grounded among us is that we have a natural love for our community. Most of us have been social activists who have lobbied not now, but years gone by, for key issues affecting Bartica to be addressed,” she posited.

Though, the current IMC has been in office for only four months, it has made significant progress in meeting the needs of residents, Ms Persaud said.

The Byderabo Dumpsite, which continues to be a major health and environmental hazard, is being rectified. The mountain of garbage had, in the past, covered the main access road, but the IMC has managed to clear the road and have garbage contained within the realm of the dumpsite. More work, however, needs to be done.

“We have managed to clear the road, and we have made it more accessible. We have been able to remove the build-up of garbage from the roadside with the hope that residents do not dump their garbage just at the entrance, as was the case in the past,” she explained.

FUTURE PLANS
Ms Persaud said the IMC is working to have the dumpsite relocated. “Our future plan is to have the dumpsite relocated. Once in office, we will convert the Byderabo Dumpsite into a green site, (and would begin) harvesting solar energy from that area. There is an area marked for a landfill site 13 miles up the Bartica/Potaro Road, close to an area we call St Mary’s, within the boundaries of Bartica,” she explained.

The unreliable supply of electricity is another issue that has been plaguing Bartica for many years, much to the dissatisfaction of residents. In fact, Ms Persaud said she was one of the residents who used to constantly protest and call on the then PPP/C Government for a new power station.

According to the APNU+AFC candidate, the protest did not end when the Administration changed. She explained that presentations were made at the level of Guyana Power and Light (GPL) Company and Central Government.

Consistent with the Government’s plans to ‘Green Bartica’, the Public Infrastructure Ministry, through a public tender process, has already received 22 bids from independent power producers to design and develop a generation system utilising an appropriate renewable energy technology or combination of technologies under a build-own-operate-and-transfer (BOOT) agreement to supply 1.5 MW of power to the GPL Bartica Grid.

The four-month-old IMC has already cleaned a number of kokers, drains and parapets in Bartica. Roads which were once impassable have been resurfaced with the help of corporate citizens. The resource centre at Byderabo, which was also in a state of disrepair, has been repaired with the instillation of telephone and Internet services for the benefit of students, in addition to the restoration of the playground at the Bartica Bandstand, Ms Persaud disclosed.