By S. Siapha Mulbah
Hundreds of Liberians under the Water-Way component of the ‘Reclaiming Liberia Beaches and Water-Way Project’ have expressed disappointment in the Youth and Sports, Minister Zoegar Wilson’s supervision of the project.
According to them, the project aimed at maintaining the sanity of beaches for environmental wellbeing and providing job opportunity for coastal residents have failed to achieve its goals due to its mismanagement by Minister Wilson.
Speaking to journalists yesterday when some disenchanted workers of the project took to the streets calling on government’s attention, Abednego Tarpeh disclosed that the Minister of Youth and Sports violated a Memorandum of Understanding signed by the two parties over the project which caused their agitation.
According to Tarpeh, the Water-Ways Project was indebted to the workers in thousands of United States Dollars and that served as a huge obstacle to continue its implementation.
Tarpeh added that the beach cleaners and the Ministry of Youth and Sport who supervised the project entered an agreement to end the first phase and start a new chapter.
“Following the agreement to guide both parties in this matter, we started working on the new phase as volunteers only because a clause in the agreement maintain that waving some of our money would give us space in the new phase of the project,” he said.
He alleged that Minister Wilson then recruited new people to take over the new phase of the project without settling the obligations to those that were captured in the MoU of the previous phase; an action he said, undermined their labor.
He maintained that their actions yesterday were provoked by a statement recently made by Minister Wilson that there is no Beach and Water-Way Project under the Ministry of Youth and Sports.
Tarpeh said the Minister’s statement was an attempt to deprive them of resources they have worked for over six months thus leaving them vulnerable and unable to respond to their respective families’ responsibilities.
“Just recently, the Minister went to the public and he even stated that they do not have any money for those that worked on the project; this is a huge setback to us and that is why we are here to call the President’s attention,” he added.
Permie Dunbar, a resident of the New Kru Town borough, said over six months she along with other Liberians swept the beaches without payment from those spearheading the project from the Ministry of Youth and Sport end.
She said the motive of accepting to work on the project was to enable her raise revenue to cater to her family; looking at the scarcity of jobs across the Liberian society.
Madam Dunbar added that instead of getting relief in her financial situation, the Beach and Water-Way Project has placed her into a more unbearable condition.
“We woke up every morning in the cold to go sweep the beach, so many things we saw but because we had no job that is why we were there making sure that the beach is clean; after all, we are hearing that the Minister has close the project we are depending on without giving us all we supposed to get,” she explained.
According to her, the situation of sweeping beaches has cost some health problems for them and the only way to respond to it is to get financial support for treatment.
Madam Dunbar asserted, “Many of us including me are now sick and doctors have told us that it is because we constantly played in the cold. We have to be treated so that our lives are not cut short and this can only happen when we get financial support. We need our pay to improve our lives.”
The disenchanted project workers paraded in several communities calling on the public to advise Minister Wilson to revisit his decision on the project.
