Dear Editor,
I offer my apologies to the Mayor and the M&CC on the issue of inadequate parking in the capital based on the Mayor’s response in SN on May 8. I don’t have the time to research the report to which the Mayor refers and since he is the expert on this issue, then I accept what he says to be the truth.
There is no crusade Your Worship. My letters are basically calls for there to be vision, justice and good leadership in our country. It is unfortunate that the President didn’t show any vision when deciding on this particular issue. Very unfortunate indeed.
In our country, there are a number of brutal cycles. One of these cycles is that we elect and employ incompetent managers. These persons make poor decisions and are incapable of accomplishing anything. And the cycle goes round and round. I see it every day. It is frustrating and appalling. We must put competent persons in key positions. That way we can delegate and forget. Management then becomes much easier and more effective.
I believe, Your Worship, that you could have addressed the issue without all the other trimmings in your response. We really as a nation have to leave all the baggage behind and stop viewing everything as a battle. I believe I heard you say something similar as well. We need to develop the habit of encouraging communication and building compromise. Not everyone is familiar with all the issues and therefore there is no need to place a wedge that prevents any objective view, even though that person’s view is not the same as yours. You will acknowledge that you feel just as strongly about the issue of inadequate parking, even earlier than I did, but you were not able to resolve the problem.
Can you provide some history on when this report by Dr Khan was presented to you? When was the case to address the parking issue mismanaged by cabinet? What have you done since? What are your plans to raise the issue again with the public and at the central government level? How often do you have town hall meetings with the public to listen to the issues of the citizens of Georgetown? I am not referring here to corner-shop chats. I mean structured town hall meetings that your staff minute. How do you publicize the before and after of these meetings? What other burning issues have you identified but central government prevented you from implementing solutions?
Finally, if all of your efforts to improve the lives of the citizens of Georgetown are being blocked and you are unable to accomplish anything, why not resign? We need as a nation, to be big on pride and develop this habit. It is the right thing to do to show disgust at anything we believe affects out ability to function and our reputation. You are what we have to refer to as an elder statesman. Why not set the example?
Is it really a case where the President and one minister stopped this from being implemented? As an aside, I wonder what is the purpose of cabinet meetings then? Why waste money on cabinet outreach and cabinet meetings in general? Let’s guesstimate here. It costs the nation about two hundred thousand dollars ($200,000.00) a day for a minister and an advisor. This is on the low side. This includes salary, clothing, subsidized housing, travelling, SUV and motor car, gasoline, driver, secretary, secretary’s assistant, security, entertainment allowance, office space, etc. As you can see, the estimate is really on the low side. We have approximately 23 ministers and let us estimate the number of advisors to be 10. So we have 33 persons attending cabinet. That means the government is wasting 6.6 million dollars one day every week just attending cabinet. What is the purpose of cabinet if the majority of views do not matter?
Dr Cheddi Jagan must be having fits of all sorts of emotions wherever he is.
Yours faithfully,
Ganesh Singh
