Businessman Lloyd Singh was a major financier of the building at Railway Line, Kitty which now houses the Alliance For Change (AFC) headquarters, party leader Khemraj Ramjattan disclosed on Saturday.
During the formal opening of the party HQ, Ramjattan, now the Minister of Public Security, singled out Singh who he described as “a personal friend…since the PPP days.” After asking Singh to stand and be acknowledged, Ramjattan recalled that the AFC was looking for a building and Singh had responded “Khemraj ah know y’all got fuh get ah building. Ah know of something.”
Ramjattan recalled Singh saying “we gotta make this thing work” and giving the AFC the advance money for the building. As a result, the party was able to occupy it, he said.
“Thank you so much Lloyd,” Ramjattan said to loud applause adding that he wanted to say that publicly.
Among the others Ramjattan mentioned was a group out of Canada that contributed $1M for the rehabilitation of the building along with lots of friends, business associates and some of his clients who did not want to be publically mentioned.
“I want to assure them that their names will soon be called because there ain’t nothing you must be afraid of at this time in Guyana,” he said while the crowd clapped in agreement. “Let’s not be afraid of anything. This is a new administration and we are gonna be here for a while,” Ramjattan declared.
He stated too that `Sankar’ gave the party approximately US$25, 000 to get started.
According to Ramjattan, having the building is a “mighty thing for a third party after knowing the politics of this country.”
“This is a major accomplishment. Thanks to all those persons who have helped us and of course thanks to all the members and leaders now who are helping with the mortgage payments,” he said.
According to the AFC leader, the building is part of “that evolving to greater things” and it is always good when an organisation can have a building where it will be headquartered so that people will not see it as “merely something that is touch and go.” Having a building, Ramjattan added, is also a symbol of strength and solidity.
Singh, the proprietor of International Pharmaceutical Agency (IPA), was identified as being among the investors in Guyana Wind Farm Incorporated (GWF) which had proposed a wind energy plant at Hope Beach.
In his budget presentation last Friday, Minister of Finance Winston Jordan said that government is negotiating a power purchase agreement with a private developer for a US$50 million wind farm at Hope Beach. This facility is expected to provide an additional 25 megawatts of power to the national grid. “Currently, the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) generates power at an average weighted cost of US$0.28 per kilowatt hour. The new project will likely offer GPL energy at less than half that cost, which will translate to lower electricity tariffs to consumers,” Jordan said.
Last October, Minister of Public Infrastructure David Patterson had said that government had approved the detailed examination of a proposal by GWF for a 26-megawatt wind energy plant at Hope Beach. Cabinet, Patterson had said, also approved detailed discussions between GWF and GPL on a possible Power Purchase Agreement that could be sealed immediately after the talks.
He had said that the investors have secured their financing for the project, which proposes a US$0.12 fee per kilowatt hour, which is comparable to the US$0.10 per kilowatt hour projected for the Amaila Falls Hydropower Project.
