PRESIDENT of Synergy Holdings Inc., Makeshwar ‘Fip’ Motilall says a barge has arrived in the country with additional equipment for the Amaila road project, which saw delays because of the rains and the lack of machinery and labour.
Speaking with the Guyana Chronicle last night,  Motilall said the barge, with 16 pieces of equipment including bulldozers and front-end loaders on board, transited the Demerara Harbour Bridge (DHB) at around 14:30hrs yesterday, and will be cleared at Omai’s wharf sometime this morning.
Explaining some of the delays, Motilall said the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) withheld their approval of the project until many pieces of information could have been supplied.
He said that while Sections One through Five of the road project were blessed with approval, Sections Six and Seven were delayed because of the environmental study of the larger Amaila Falls Hydro-project being tied to those sections.
Because of the non-granting of permission for the two last sections of the road project, equipment had to be relocated to commence work on the sections for which permission was had.
On Tuesday, there will be a press conference at the Pegasus Hotel to launch the approved Environmental and Social Impact Assessment of the hydro project.
Motilall continues to maintain that funding for the larger project was secured with the Government of Guyana having an option, but not an obligation to take part in equity financing. Some of the GRIF funds have been set aside for the financing of equity into the hydro project for 2010 and 2011.
Engineer attached to the Ministry of Public Works and Communication, Mr. Walter Willis said recently that the road project is now just about 20 percent complete.
Willis told the Guyana Chronicle that the hope is to have substantial completion of Sections Two, Three, Four and Five by June 2, and by the middle of August, Sections Six and Seven to a point where they can accommodate all-terrain vehicles (ATVs) and four-wheel-drive (4WD) pick-ups and trucks.
Willis explained that the contractor was given 240 days, from the time of the award of the first construction notice to proceed, by which to complete the works, and that was issued on October 5, 2010, with the second on January 11, 2011.
Willis said the 20 percent progress on the project should have been by this time closer to 50 percent, and noted that 65 percent of the time has already elapsed for the completion of the road.
He however expressed the hope that the road project could be brought back on schedule with the additional equipment and improvement in the weather.
The road is the precursor to the larger Amaila Falls Hydroelectric Scheme, which will take about four years to be done.
That facility, which is expected to have at least 140 megawatts of electricity capacity, would be sited along the Kuribrong River in Potaro.