GOB borrows US $7 million more for George Price highway rehabilitation

Posted: Monday, November 26, 2018. 7:11 pm CST.

By BBN Staff: During last Friday’s sitting of the House of representatives, the government introduced a motion to borrow an additional US $7 million for the George Price Highway Rehabilitation Project. To date, GOB has borrowed some US $27 million from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) since 2015 to pave a stretch from mile 47 to mile 67 of the highway.

According to Prime Minister Dean Barrow, the additional financing will be used to meet the costs of the supervision of civil works, utilities relocation and environmental and social mitigation measures. Lake Independence area representative, Cordel Hyde, however raised concern about the motion. According to Hyde, “You had an original loan agreement for Bz $54 million to pave this stretch of highway from Roaring Creek to Santa Elena and then you now come back to the honorable house and say you need $14 million more. Who is advising the government? I mean, what is happening here?”

“I think the revealing thing about this is that it reveals just how shady the Faber’s Road project was. Here you are talking about 19.4 miles; to pave and outfit 19.4 miles and it is coming up at $68 million, close to $70 million, which would put a mile a road at $3.4 million, there about. And it is the bumpiest and ugliest mile of paved road we’ve seen in this country outside of Lake I Boulevard. Faber’s Road cost us you know how much, madam speaker? $8 million,” Hyde added.

Minister of Works, Rene Montero, however, defended the motion explaining that GOB needed to acquire several costly parcels of land around the area for the project, and said much of the financing is being spent on safety measures as well as widening the roads.

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