Latest update April 25th, 2024 12:59 AM
Sep 27, 2016 Letters
Dear Editor,
The plot of the infamous parking meter deal between the Georgetown City Council and three unknown and obscure companies is thickening, with the latest development being an apparent power struggle and contest for recognition. One should not be surprised at this if one is familiar with the history of the deceptive deal.
The tortuous journey begins with the setting up of an opaque company going by the name National Parking Systems (NPS) sometime around 1995 with Mr. Ifa Kamau Cush as its Chief Executive Officer and the only other Director being listed as Patrick Triumph with the title of Managing Director, who lives in the United States as well and who strangely resigned in April 2016 leaving Cush as the only person in NPS.
This Guyanese registered company listed its address as 387 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10016, a very upscale part of Manhattan where the rent is extremely high. However security and other officials in the building that NPS claims as the address from which it rents office space, emphatically denied that National Parking Systems had an office there, leading to the first set of concerns by citizens. There is a claim being made by Mr. Cush; that a contract was signed between NPS and the Georgetown Municipality in 1996, however to date this contract was never produced for public scrutiny, a second concern for citizens.
Thankfully the Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, at that time smelt the stench of this so called parking initiative and stopped them from implementing this illusory proposal. The third unease for the public was a claim by Cush and the Council that NPS had partnered with a company called Smart City Solutions to install the parking system, with the very Cush who is the owner/president of National Parking Systems being also a director of Smart City Solutions, the company he brought to the table to assist him in installing parking meters
But there seems to be two Smart City Solutions, one that is owned and controlled by Cush for which he presents himself as its Managing Director along with a Panama City-based Businessman going by the name of Simon Moshevilli which was registered on May 6, 2016 with just these two Directors. Cush announced to the public at large that Smart City Solutions was specifically established for the purpose of installing parking meters in Guyana, and that it was a locally formed company, a locally registered company, established specifically for the Georgetown Municipality Parking Meter project, that is a special purpose vehicle.
How then could the Council have signed the contract with the first Smart City back in October of 2015 when this company was only set up in May 2016? Then Cush talks of another Smart City Solutions, one which is owned by a Mexican Company – Operadora de Estacionamientos Bicentenario, S A de C V for which he Cush is a mere shareholder without an operational position. One that he claims is headquartered in Mexico City and which has been operating in most of Latin America, and South America, including Argentina, Lima, Peru, Panama and Mexico City, boasting that the company has, for the past five years, operating and managing about 20,000 spaces in Mexico City alone.
He also claimed that this other Smart City has been involved in parking meters consultancy in Chicago, USA. This new Smart City Solutions (SCS) however, has an Amir Oren, listed as its International Director of Business Development, who it is claimed would be spearheading the project and not Cush, a fourth confusion and concern for citizens. However Cush is claiming to be totally unaware of the change.
All this while Councilors are told that they cannot get a copy of the contract but can make an appointment with the Town Clerk to see it, a fifth concern for all. It should be noted that this 49 year contract will tie the hands of not only the current residents of Georgetown, but also their children, grandchildren and perhaps great-great-grandchildren and shows a disdain for citizens and Councillors who are excluded and alienated from the decision-making process. I don’t understand why the Attorney General’s Office did not recommend that the persons involved in this deal be turned over to the police and Director of Public Prosecutions in order for justice to be served.
Amber Valentine
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The two people at the head of the GT municipality make the PPP look like angels. They also expose the fragile control Mr. Granger has over people who seem obsessed with “getting theirs” regardless of the damage it does to the reputation of the PNC and the people of Guyana.