Harmon says parking meter by-laws suspended to allow for review; Jagdeo lashes out at Gov’t for “incompetency”
By Stacy Carmichael-James
Minister of State Joseph Harmon today said the controversial parking meter by-laws which have sparked protest action was suspended to allow a thorough review by all stakeholders, however, Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo is not satisfied with the Government’s role in the fiasco, calling for the entire cabinet to resign for its “incompetency.”
The review, Harmon said will see the participation of all stakeholders, in an effort to afford everyone the opportunity to highlight the aspects of the project that affect them. “This is why we have said let us have an open transparent process in reviewing this project so that at the end of these three months we can have something in the best interest of us all,” he noted.
Meanwhile, Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo said the fact that Minister Harmon cannot state what will happen after the three-month suspension of the by-laws, just exposes the ineptitude of the Government.
He lashed out at the Government for not allowing the contract to first go through a public tendering process. The Opposition Leader is contending that the Government had sufficient information to reject the Parking Meter Project from the onset, yet it was approved.
The fact that Government was privy to the initial contract in order to craft the by-laws and that the Ministry of Finance deemed it a bad contract, Jagdeo said was enough information for the contract to be revoked.
” The entire Government should resign for incompetence and for being useless, so they were not clear about this information and that’s why they have suspended it. They suspend it now because of the public pressure …and they are hoping to get beyond the protest curve, so that when people see this now, they would ease off, they would say that our wonderful Government intervened, although they were complicit, they didn’t intervene here to save people …they are just reversing for a short while, their own action,” Jagdeo commented.
Jagdeo believes that after those three months, the Parking Meter Project would re-emerge in a different form and citizens would still have to pay for parking in the city.
He accused the Government of openly lying and making excuses, citing the case of increases in wages and salaries for ministers of Government, which Jagdeo said was first denied until it was uncovered by the media.
