Recent returnees to the homeland may not know this, but longtime dwellers who have endured through successive Guyanese governments will tell you that finding the person responsible for a particular aspect in the various departments set up to serve us is an almost impossible task. In the first place, some items one might would assume would come under Ministry A have actually been taken over by Ministry B, or, worse yet, sometimes no one knows exactly where they’ve been moved.
Once location is determined, the nature of your enquiry will occasionally reveal that yours is not a government matter, at all, such as road repair in a private commercial development, where the developer is no longer in business or may not even be alive. Sometimes, delighted to find the correct department for your enquiry, you are told on your second call that the original information you received was in error – that department is, in fact, not responsible – and that therefore you are back to square one.
The foregoing is intended to establish that having a number of “thank you” messages to deliver in various areas, I am not about to embark on that painfully frustrating exercise of not knowing whom to call, and to avoid the irritation of “holding on” until the resurgent dial phone tells me I’m talking to myself. In short, since I don’t know who is responsible for some small but important mercies I have been receiving since the last election, I’m taking this route to say a public thanks.
A prime example is the side road in the Industry area where I live. For five years or more, our network of five or six neighbourhood roads has been suffering from a general lack of attendance resulting in significant pot-holes at various points. Whichever devil it is that designs such things somehow manages to produce pot-holes in clusters so that to avoid one is simply to land in another; such are the ones where I live.
For five years, at four different stretches of the road, I encounter them, or, more aptly, they encounter me. This week, with no fanfare or announcement in the press, some folks from some government department came to our area and filled in the holes. No one seems to know who did the work or when (it must have been after all the dogs had gone to sleep), but I’m taking this opportunity to thank the workers, whoever or wherever they are.
Similarly, on the Seawall Road that serves our community to the north, I am witnessing this week, gangs of men, with shovels and spades and hedge trimmers, removing the grass on the boulevard that divides the road. It’s been unattended for years, with cows often parked on them munching away, but finally, attendance is at hand.
Mind you, the folks who own the grazing cows are probably unhappy, but to whoever is responsible for the clean-up, send me your name and I’ll send you a CD of your choice. I had actually planned to toot my horn going by and showing them a high five, but in these politicized times the guys might have misunderstood the sign and they were holdings shovels and other fierce-looking implements.
Motorists who come to our town will tell you of the irritation that previously existed on Water Street to the east, approaching Cowan Street, where the roadway seemed to have been hit by a Russian missile missing in Syria. The holes were spread across the road; there was no way to escape them. Motorists going west would stop at the area, offering a by-pass to motorists going east, who were also stopped to avoid the holes facing them.
Eventually, both sides would simply have to endure the maze, banging and swerving as they went. Today, that part of east Water Street is heaven. It’s a short stretch, but I actually turned around and drove over it twice last week, to be sure. Some of our roads people have put things right, and we are grateful to them.
The trench behind our property, which drains to the east, has been weed-covered and bush lined for years. Two weeks ago, some workmen from the agency responsible (don’t ask me which) had excavators working there for four days, ripping out the duck week, dredging the wide waterway, removing the bush on the parapets and creating a neat earthen dam on both sides.
The water in the trench is visible once again, and the drainage to the east, destined for the Ogle koker, is obviously much improved. Whoever is responsible for that, Merry Christmas to you.
One final thank-you for me has to do with the area east of the Vlissengen Road/Seawall Road junction. Previously, waiting for the light to change going west, one would look to the right and see an area of towering grass and untended parapets creating a sea of jungle green – an embarrassment for any city, particularly this so-called “garden” one. Recently, the area has been cleaned down to the base, the narrow trench below, which was previously invisible, is on view again, and today there are fence posts in place for the triangular piece of land that sits to the north with a rickety building on it; it appears very likely that a park of sorts will be created there.
I knew better than trying a phone call to verify that, but whatever the plan is for the area, thanks to the folks responsible for the transformation.
I know without asking that persons reading this column will have their own private appreciation list for recent changes – central Georgetown in particular – but I’m taking the opportunity to lay mine out publicly here. So to the working men and women mentioned above, who remain unknown and unreachable to me, I hope that you either catch this verbal bouquet directly, or that someone else passes it to you. Thanks for the clean-up and the repair and the filling in and the smoothing over. I don’t know you by name or by section, but you’re in my good books.
