THE Mayor and City Council (M&CC) is currently awaiting the first draft of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) from the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) to move forward with discussions on issues of mutual interest between the two bodies.

Following a meeting between the GCCI and the MCC on Monday, February 4, the two sides were expected to meet again last Friday, February 8, to begin work on the setting up of a bilateral committee and drafting of a MoU that would govern the committee.
The MoU was expected to be prepared by the GCCI.

Speaking with the Guyana Chronicle on Wednesday, Georgetown Mayor Ubraj Narine confirmed that the Friday meeting had not gone through, pending submission of the MoU. However, he is hopeful that the document will be submitted soon.

“The chamber of commerce ought to have submitted a MoU to us Friday, but that did not happen. I made contact and they said to me it will happen before the week is out,” Narine explained on Wednesday. He added: “When the chamber of commerce sends over the MoU, we have to vet it and see what is our necessary input.”

Narine explained that the council has also been in discussion on the selection of their representatives to be on the bilateral committee.
GCCI President Deodat Indar, said he could not speak on the current situation surrounding the partnership.

“I can’t give any comment on this issue right now… it’s a work in progress, I hope you understand that,” Indar remarked on Wednesday.

At the February 4 meeting, a three-week timeline was given for formalising of the MoU.
Apart from addressing the issue of the parking meters and the establishing of an institutional working relationship between the MCC and the GCCI, the meeting had originally also been scheduled to discuss the issue of garbage receptacles around the city of Georgetown, and the levying of local authority taxes.

On the issue of the parking meters, Indar affirmed that the GCCI’s position has not changed from its original call for revocation of the controversial parking meter contract between the M&CC and Smart City Solutions.

The meeting had opened with the discussion on the parking meters. However, Mayor Narine expressed the view that the establishment of an institutional working relationship between the GCCI and the M&CC took precedence over the other issues, as it would provide guidance on all other future engagements between the two bodies.

The GCCI was somewhat skeptical to put all the focus on the formation of a committee, with Indar pointing out that an initiative in the past to establish a committee with the private sector and the MCC had fallen by the wayside.

In 2016, President David Granger had recommended the formation of a tripartite committee involving the Private Sector Commission (PSC), the M&CC and central government. However, the PSC complained that, at that time, the MCC continued to miss the meetings and the initiative never took off.

Indar, however, said the GCCI was not altogether unwilling to trust in a committee’s establishment, but needed to see concrete efforts on the part of the M&CC to feel reassured going forward and have evidence that they could take back and report to their over 200 members to show that progress was being made.

To expedite the situation, the Friday, February 8 date for the second meeting and three-week deadline for the MoU was set.