Chaos erupts in Nat'l Assembly as govt. drowns Berbice River Bridge motion
By Gordon French
Kaieteur News
January 25, 2007
The National Assembly ended in chaos on Tuesday night when a Motion moved by Prime Minister Samuel Hinds to close the debate relating to the construction of the Berbice River Bridge was disallowed by Acting Speaker Clarissa Riehl.
People's National Congress Reform-One Guyana (PNCR-1G) MP, James McAllister tabled the Berbice River Bridge Motion in the National Assembly seeking to have government review its decision to build a steel floating bridge between D'Edward and Crab Island and to stop construction of the bridge for three months to facilitate a study.
At the end of the debate, Hinds sought to utilize Standing Order 39 (1) which allows a Minister to conclude a debate on any Motion which is critical of the government or reflects adversely on or is calculated to bring discredit upon the government or a government officer.
Riehl disallowed the Prime Minister's request by stating that the Motion was not critical of the government but the debate was. This sparked a huge protest from the government side of the House, which later led to heated exchanges between members of both sides of the House.
During the dispute, Riehl threatened to walk out of the proceedings.
Opening the debate on the Motion, McAllister rejected claims that his Motion has sinister objectives.
“This Motion is patriotic in nature and seeks to protect the interest of this and future generations of young people,” McAllister stated.
However, Minister of Works and Hydraulics, Robeson Benn rejected this position of McAllister to bring the Motion on the Berbice Bridge to be debated in the National Assembly.
He said any attempt to take this issue along the path to stall the construction of the bridge will result in loss of investor, and investor confidence in the country and would also effectively sabotage the bridge.
“It upsets me when I hear that the suggestion that building a bridge at its current location is an attack on one particular ethnic group in this country,” Minister Benn stated.
He added that the placement of the bridge at its current site, north of the Canje Bridge, reduces the loading that goes across the Canje Bridge and reduces the congestion of traffic in New Amsterdam.
According to Benn, government is spending millions to rehabilitate the road network in New Amsterdam, including the road to Mara on the East Bank of Berbice.
He stated that Berbice at this significant point in time represents a horde of development projects, included among which is the Skeldon Sugar Project.
“They want to keep Berbice as an ancient town… any attack covert, ambushed or otherwise, is not only an attack on Berbice, but it is an attack on Guyana and Guyanese,” Benn asserted.
He added that the construction of the Demerara Harbour Bridge at its current location did not result in any massive economic loss to any community.
McAllister, during his presentation, stated that the bridge constitutes a bottleneck in the trade between Suriname and French Guiana on one hand, and Guyana, Brazil and Venezuela on the other.
“It cannot be any bridge,” he said, adding that the bridge must take into consideration Guyana's national development agenda.
He argued that placing the bridge upstream has serious economic implications, especially since communities on the West Bank of the Berbice River, as well as New Amsterdam, will suffer.
McAllister accused the government of dillydallying on three attempts to construct a bridge upstream of Everton.
He alluded to a study conducted by the Louis Berger Group which steered Government to the current location of the Bridge.
He said that the Group ignored the lowest cost options of placing the bridge at a point that will take traffic through Ithaca and New Amsterdam as identified in a 1997 report produced by the US-based Figg Engineers Inc.
The Group's study stated that a floating bridge between D'Edward and Crab Island is the most economical option and that the Canje Bridge was inadequate to put the traffic of the bridge over since it had neither shoulders nor walkways.
McAllister stated that the floating bridge even though recommended by Berger, is presented as a temporary solution to the bridging of the Berbice River.
He then posited that the government ignored a report done by Patricio Millan Development Consultants, which established that the Berger report grossly underestimated the cost of construction and maintenance of the steel floating bridge.
McAllister argued that Millan's report noted that the rate of return on investment of a floating bridge was 10.8 per cent, in contrast to the 12 per cent stated in the Berger report.
He added that the Millan report stated that a fixed bridge spanning the river from Providence on the East Bank and Augsburg on the West Bank was the best viable option with a 13.3 per cent rate of return on investment.
Benn refused to accept that the government had erred and referred to the study conducted by the Louis Berger Group which stated that a concrete bridge was too expensive.
He alluded that the present location is tied to saving in terms of operating cost, time and vehicle operation.
Other contributors to Tuesday's evening's debate included David Patterson of the Alliance For Change (AFC); John Austin of the PNCR-1G; Minister of Health, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy and Agriculture Minister, Robert Persaud.
The Berbice Bridge Company Inc. (BBCI) in August of last year presented the consortium of Bosch Rexroth BV of the Netherlands and Mabey & Johnson of the United Kingdom with a cheque for US$5.4M, representing the first tranche of payment for the construction of the bridge.
Minister Benn assured that the bridge is on track to be completed during the first half of 2008.