– former NDC ChairmanFormer Chairman of the Mora/Parika Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC), Moti Singh, has called for the Interim Management Committee (IMC) to be dissolved. Singh is making the demand based on what he claims are complaints by residents in the community.According to the former chairman, a request was made last year to dissolve the IMC based on the fact that the body was incapable of running the council. The request was made by way of a petition signed by more than 200 residents of the Mora/Parika district.The residents state that they are dissatisfied with the way the district is being managed, citing the lack of road repairs even though ‘crushed runner’ is available and has been in stock since the NDC was functioning. They pointed out also that the drains were not cleaned over a long period of time and the road shoulders have not been cleared of excess growth.However, it seems that the petition has been ignored. According to Singh, it was sent to the Regional Office, the subject Ministries and the Office of the President, but to date nothing has been done.Since the petition has been seemingly ignored, Singh added that the residents are publicly asking that the administration do something about dismantling the IMC and replace it with a better functioning body.Singh stated that the IMC was established in late 2008. It’s establishment resulted from a petition signed by twenty-two persons, ten of whom lived outside of the NDC district. “However the Minister saw it fit to dissolve the NDC based on a hearing that was done,” Singh said, adding that the recommendation coming out of that hearing was that the NDC was too depleted and an IMC was put in place.Singh stated that residents continue to complain about bad roads and flooding in the community, due to the negligence of the IMC and the regional administration. The claim is that no maintenance has been done in infrastructure, the former chairman pointed out that both the Regional Office and the IMC are blaming each other.“They are claiming that they are not getting labourers to work to clean the drains,” said Singh,Jerseys NBA China, adding that this claim is unfortunate when there is a 30 per cent unemployment rate in Guyana. He claimed that the labourers in the community are willing to work but the relationship between them and the IMC is not a good one. Singh did not elaborate on that relationship.In the interim, while residents are cleaning their immediate surroundings, vacant lots and Government reserves are not taken care of and these are the areas where the problems surface, and rebound to affect the residents.
