-Liberia’s Public Works Minister Mobutu Nyenpan tells House Plenary
By Mark N.Mengonfia,mmenginfia@gmail.com
Liberia’s Minister for Public Works, Mobutu V. Nyenpan say that one hundred and thirty two thousand, six hundred (US$132,600.00) is the projected cost to rehabilitate street/traffic lights in the Liberian capital, Monrovia.
In central Monrovia, frames of pre-war nonfunctional street lights remain on the main Broad Street without serving any purpose, while new ones installed at the intersection of the main seaport (Freeport of Monrovia) and Sinkor erected by a Chinese road company which rehabilitated some roads few years ago have been off for a protracted period of time.
But the Public Works Minister has blamed the Finance Ministry for failing to make the money available, even after vouchers were raised over the past year.
Appearing before the full plenary of the House of Representatives earlier this week (September 10 2019), Minister Nyenpan said after they received the mandate from the House of Representatives to have the lights rehabilitated, his Ministry carried out assessments.
Minister Nyenpan indicated that after the assessments, the MOP put out a bidding process in 2018 which was won by one Liberian company.
He indicated that on Oct 9, 2018, they signed new contract to have the traffic lights brought back to life.
“On May 9,2019 the Liberian contractor started removing the batteries to have them replace” Minister Nyenpan said. According to him, he has raised many vouchers to have the contractor money pay, but till present not of the vultures have turned into chicks.
The tone of Minister Nyenpan during the hearing shows that he was casting all of the blame at the feet of the Minister of Finance.
“We have tried our best to be sensitive to the issues affecting Liberians. We want to do the people’s work but it is not working as planned,” the Liberian Public Works Minister told Lawmakers.
He went on to say that on June 4th, the contractor instilled two new batteries to revamp the traffic lights around and VAMUMA and Capitol by-pass.
The Works Minister indicated that out of the US$48 million budget his ministry presented in the 2017/2018 budget, one 40% the ministry revived.