THE Movement Against Parking Meters (MAPM) on Friday said it believes that City Hall should immediately implement the recommendation of Cabinet to suspend the parking meter project instead of waiting until City Mayor Patricia Chase-Green returns to Guyana.

“We see that as a stalling mechanism. Smart City Solutions (SCS) is here to make money. They claim that they’re here to bring order to the city; that is total nonsense. We reject that,” MAPM member, Marcel Gaskin told reporters at a press conference held at the Private Sector Commission (PSC) on Waterloo Street.

The suspension of parking meters is reportedly awaiting the return of Mayor Patricia Chase-Green, who is currently in the United States on an official visit.

Gaskin is of the view that the implementation of Cabinet’s recommendation is being stalled to allow SCS to rake in as much revenue as it can in the meantime.

“The enforcement aspect of the project brings in more revenue than the actual parking, so the spate of clamping that we’re seeing now is to make up in the shortfall of revenues that they’ve experienced over the last month. The Cabinet, government, should be firm with them.

If Mr. Duncan is in fact the defacto mayor at this time, he should be allowed to function and make the decisions; so the government needs to ensure that due process is followed at City Hall,” stated Gaskin.

When contacted on Friday, Deputy Mayor Sherod Duncan said there is nothing precluding the City Council from moving ahead to implement the recommendation immediately. “We can go ahead now. We can go ahead and suspend the thing. Why keep stalling and asking for clarity? The Mayor can call me from the U.S. and I’m sure the Town Clerk has been in contact with her. This is not rocket science.”

According to Duncan, all that needs to be done is for King to call an extraordinary statutory meeting at which 16 out of 25 votes would be required to suspend the project.

“Majority are APNU councillors so I don’t know who will vote against the recommendation of Cabinet. I don’t know why we have to wait until she (the Mayor) comes back. We should go ahead and suspend this thing. There is nothing precluding us.”

Meanwhile, at the press conference, Gaskin said the MAPM is fully supportive of Cabinet’s decision regarding the project. “The government may not have as its end-game the revocation; we have, because we see that a lot of things were not done and therefore you can’t make a bad thing good just like that; you need to scrap it and start from scratch.”

Head of the Private Sector Commission, Ramesh Persaud said that commission is extremely disappointed by the Town Clerk, Royston King’s objection to Cabinet’s request for the suspension of paid parking.

“We are also very much alarmed over the level of confusion facing this project. It is a significant embarrassment to us as a country. We are getting confused signals from all parties. Our city is almost dead; and that death is being announced by black flags being flown by businesses around the city that have actually indicated to us that their business is declining and is on the sick bed,” Persaud stated.

MAPM member, Komal Ramnauth said the movement will continue its protest until an end is brought to the parking meter contract.

Another MAPM member, Pauline Chase proffered that should the existing court actions prove unsuccessful when they come up again, there are still many other grounds on which different actions can be filed.

“There are so many illegalities and unconstitutionalities with regard to this system. Particularly the people who were clamped or booted or immobilised, they should seek legal counsel because they may have good claims as to damages.”

Chase is encouraging other members of society to challenge the system by bringing forward more actions.

Meanwhile, Ramesh Dookhoo said he was very concerned that SCS continues to clamp vehicles. “The population is confused and we should encourage SCS to remove the clamping from the streets because it can end up in violent encounters as we’ve seen in the past,” said Dookhoo.