“It is a way of siphoning money coming to the end,” said Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo as he spoke to the merit of several projects that the government has embarked on, including the construction of schools.
Earlier this week, the Ministry of Education and BK International Incorporated signed an $826M contract to build a modern Yarrowkabra Secondary School.
Signing the contract was Education Minister, Dr. Nicolette Henry and contractor Brian Tiwari. The school will have the capacity to house 600 students from Yarrowkabra and surrounding communities and is to be completed within 12 months.
It was also noted that Tuesday’s signing was in keeping with the president’s Decade of Development plan in which education is to play a crucial role.
“The intention is to have excellent secondary schools in every region at key positions so that students who have exited the primary level can have a school to produce the best and brightest to function in the 21st century,” Minister Henry stated.
In addition to classrooms, the school will feature IT, technical and vocational, and science labs, allied arts facilities, and an auditorium.
Tiwari gave the assurance that the job would be of the highest standard and that VIKAB Engineering Consultants Ltd would supervise the construction.
But while the government spoke a lot about the necessity for the school saying that it is a move in the direction of much-desired development, Jagdeo thinks that the deal is one of many that smacks of corruption.
He said, “When I see a contract suddenly appearing, costing almost 1B dollars, $800 and something million, for a school and when I see who the central players are, I can put my head on a block that it is corrupt.”
Jagdeo said that it is all part of a massive plot to leave the treasury broke.
“They run down the reserves, sold off the gold…so the new government comes into the office and has to pay tens of billions of dollars of bills that they already ran up. So all this splurging now is designed to create an era of prosperity but somebody has to pay for it come March,” said Jagdeo.
He claimed to have information that the Lotto Fund and many other funds including the Asphalt Plant fund have been raided. “They going all for broke, so whatever happens to the new government is not their business.
Again, Jagdeo issued a warning to all public servants in positions where they would have to sign off on deals being made “in this period.” He said that they can get themselves into “serious trouble for breaching our financial laws.”
