I WRITE to vent my frustration about the lack of responsiveness from the Government to the appeals of a relatively small group of persons who comprise our housing group in Yarrowkabra.To provide some context as to the reason for our frustration, a summarised background is as follows: I and my group members were given houselots in Yarrowkabra since 2002. We spent a lot of money to clean the land and have built three complete houses, and four partially completed. There are also six laid foundations. We had appealed to the past Administration for several years for electricity in the area, but all we ever got was a lot of unfulfilled promises. If we had been given electricity, I am confident that we would have completed most of the houses by now, if not all.
When the new government took office, the group members (myself included) felt a surge of hope that we would finally make some headway with our request for electricity in the area. I wrote a letter to Mr. Moses Nagamootoo, the Honourable Prime Minister, who replied to my letter referring me to the Honourable Minister of Public Infrastructure, Mr. David Patterson, Mr. Joseph Harmon, Honourable Minister of Ministry of the Presidency and the Honourable Junior Minister of Communities, Ms. Valerie Sharpe-Patterson. I also wrote to President Granger separately, but got no reply from any of them. I am therefore left to conclude that my group and I have been thrown in a corner by the APNU+AFC Administration, pretty much the same way the PPP Administration did. We are sorely disappointed that we are getting the same treatment we received under the previous Administration, from the APNU+AFC government. We appreciate that the new government has a lot of mess to clean up from the previous Administration and we have seen positive changes in our society, but we are appealing that some attention be given to the ‘small man’ in society who is trying to move forward.
One of the things we find very interesting is that an area relatively close to ours in Yarrowkabra has electricity, so we cannot understand why it seems to be such a complicated issue for us to be given electricity as well. We have not asked for infrastructure (roads, running water, etc.), which we also need, but our intention is to do as much as we possibly can do with self-help, but there is not much more we can do without electricity, because our homes are vulnerable to bandits and unsavory elements.
I would like to make it clear that I am a very open, impartial person and I have a lot of respect and admiration for the APNU+AFC government. I especially would like to mention that Mr. Nagamootoo and Mr. Ramjattan have earned my respect even before they became a part of the coalition government, because they left the PPP party and government when they could not stand its corruption and wrong doings anymore. I consider them men of integrity and they did the honourable thing to walk away.
That being said, regardless of my respect and admiration for the new government, I will call a “spade’ a ‘spade.” The APNU+AFC government must seek to put things in place so that the concerns of the “small man” in this country could be taken care of as well. Could someone in the government please listen to our appeals and grant us the electricity we seek?
Arthur Taylor