Dear Editor,
Notwithstanding the value and advantages all over the world of local democracy which is the self-government of cities, towns, villages and districts by democratic means, typically, but not exclusively, through elected mayors, councils and other local officials, when one looks at the ailing Georgetown Municipality, one cannot help but wonder whether it would not make more sense for Central Government to just dissolve the Council and take over fully the functions that statutorily belong to the municipality, under a Government department and just get rid of the incompetent, corrupt and parasitic municipal officers that are draining the city’s resources.

The Central Government has had to take over the massive debt owed to the garbage contractors last year and continue paying them until the end of 2017 to avoid a major embarrassment and health risk during the holidays.
Since the Government has stopped paying them at the beginning of this year, enormous garbage piles have reappeared almost instantly. Such a shame!

Despite the Council receiving market rents and property rates, all of the rat infested, crime prone and leaking municipal markets continue to deteriorate into some of the most unhealthy and unsightly shopping centres in the world.
Again Central Government has had to intervene, this time bailing the Council out with more than twenty five million dollars to complete the rehabilitation of the Kitty Market. Just preposterous!

If the Central Government does not build, maintain and rehabilitate the roads within the capital, including those under the direct control and curtilage of the Mayor and City Council, then no one would be able to drive any longer, as they all would become impassable. Why is this so when a portion of your property rates is supposed to go towards road building and maintenance? And to add insult to injury, they tried to foist a parking meter albatross around the necks of vehicle owners as yet another punitive municipal tax.

Street lighting, another fundamental responsibility of the Council, is completely ignored by them and left for the Central Government to look after. They also refuse to settle its account of more than one billion dollars that it owes to the GPL. Is the Council not ashamed of itself?
The municipal abattoir must be one of the most archaic and insalubrious meat processing centres in this hemisphere, and the City Police Training Centre is in a ruinous state. All compliments of the Georgetown City Council.

Just walk around Georgetown and witness the vagrants and junkies that sleep and live on the pavements, harassing passers-by each day, encounter the mosquitoes at night, and the flooding that occurs after half an hour of rain.
Should this depraved, useless and corrupt Council not be replaced by some entity that could deliver the goods to the citizens of Georgetown?

Best regards,
Sambu Jacobus