Gov’t examining options to help vendors during East Coast road expansion
Vice President, Dr Bharrat Jagdeo met and engaged directly with residents and vendors of the community of Plaisance (Photo: Facebook/June 28, 2023)
Still, the Vice President assured people that Government Ministers and their technical staff will be engaging with communities directly to determine agreeable solutions.
Plaisance vendors staged protests on Tuesday after they were served with a seven-day notice that they had to move to facilitate road expansion works. Jagdeo on Tuesday said that notice was “crude” and should not have been sent out before officials consulted with the people who would be affected.
Now, while the stakeholders hope to find these mutually-agreeable solutions, Jagdeo said the vendors have been given six months to relocate from the areas where the expansion will occur.
But he does not believe that this extension will in any way delay the roadworks. He said the road spans about 25 miles from Georgetown to Mahaica and there are enough unoccupied spaces where the contractor can begin work in the meantime.
The government has awarded a US$184 million contract for the new four-lane highway which will stretch from Sheriff Street in the city to Mahaica, East Coast Demerara. It is expected to be completed in two and a half years.
The contract has been awarded to China Railway First Group Limited, the Chinese construction firm that worked on the four-lane expansion of the East Coast Demerara public road, which straddles the Atlantic ocean.
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