The ratio of Guyanese to Chinese workers on the US$138 million Cheddi Jagan International Airport Expansion Project is in line with what is stipulated in the contract, Public Infrastructure Minister David Patterson said yesterday.
He stressed that Guyanese were not being side-lined for jobs at the site noting that there was a ratio stipulated in the contract with China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) the contractor for the project.
Patterson told members of the media during a press briefing that there were currently 76 Guyanese employed at the job site and 57 Chinese.
The Ministry’s Special Technical Advisor Walter Willis stated, “It is a design build. They have the responsibility to deliver the end product within a certain time. Their experts that they bring in are not in competition with people that they are taking [on] locally.”
Neither the minister nor Willis clarified the positons that were held by the Chinese workers and if those positons could have been filled by local Guyanese expertise. Willis instead noted that the Chinese were not bringing in drivers to man the trucks that Guyanese were filling those vacancies.
He said that the 76 Guyanese employees consisted of operators, drivers, cook, cleaners, security personnel and labourers.
Willis did also state that work on the job site was ongoing, as well as that which would allow for the drainage of water away from the work site when necessary.
While Willis explained that the contract did not stipulate that Guyana was responsible for penalties should there be a delay, the minister revealed that the relocation of the 15 Timehri residents was ongoing.
Patterson said that the 15 persons would be located less than a mile away in a new scheme that could comfortably hold over 50 house lots. He said it was a “stone’s throw away if you throw hard” from where the 15 currently reside and as such the ministry was working alongside the Ministry of Communities to have the area regularized promptly.
The project resumed in August after discussions were held between CHEC and the ministry to determine the future costs of the project and what the government’s expectations were.
Patterson had said it would not exceed its initial US$150 million cost and completion is expected by the second quarter of 2017.
A one-week-long discussion with CHEC, Patterson explained, resulted in a US$46.8 million claim made by the company being reduced to roughly half of that amount. Some of the issues responsible for the claim included design changes and cost overruns.
The minister said that a cap of US$23.7 million cannot be exceeded, inclusive of all variations and designs for the proposed work.
Prior to the discussions with CHEC, Patterson had told Stabroek News that the ballooning costs for the project were not fiscally realistic and indicated that it should cost less than US$150 million.
Critics of the project, including members of the present government while they were in opposition, had accused CHEC of overpricing in aspects of its contract.
