Stage lighting at the National Cultural Centre (NCC) is expected to be given an upgrade as a tender was yesterday received for the contract.
The bid, submitted by R. Kissoon Contracting and pegged at $14.3M, was yesterday opened at the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board’s (NPTAB) weekly tender openings.
However, it is unclear if the project will be retendered as the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports, which is the procuring entity, gave an engineer’s estimate of $9.2M.
Over the years there have been many complaints by patrons and producers of poor facilities at the National Cultural Centre.
In January, of this year, Minister of Culture, Dr Frank Anthony had said that it would cost over $80M to fix faults to the building.
His remarks had come in wake of an appeal by the NCC Director Godfrey Naughton to the Ministry of Culture to assist in helping to pay the centre’s utility bills. Naughton had said that the NCC was “up to its neck” in expenses and that producers were being chased away by the high cost of renting the centre.
Speaking at the awards ceremony for the National Drama Festival, he had also complained that the state of the NCC was affecting the practical work of students at the National Drama School—which is housed in the NCC—and that the platform used for performance needed improvement. He talked about the poor lighting and sound conditions that actors were forced to work under and he labelled them outdated.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports also received bids for works at the New Opportunity Corps (NOC). The companies and their respective bids are shown in the tables below.
Repairs to range house, Phase 2, of the NOC.
