May 31, 2021
By Aruna Kamara
Some councilors of the Bo City Council (BCC) have told this medium that they remain unimpressed with the action of some feeder road contractors in Bo district. The councilors claimed that some contractors constructing the feeder road are jittery whenever they are around to monitor them.
Other councilors out rightly said they don’t have any knowledge of the contractors who are building their roads.
The councilors raised this concern at the Fifth Ordinary Council meeting, which took place at the Council’s Chamber on Thursday, 27 May 2021and attracted members of the public including civil society organizations and traders in Bo.
According to the councilors, it is their responsibility to monitor the road works to ensure that it is done to the admiration of the people in their wards.
In her statement, the Chief Administrator of the Bo City Council, Veronica Josephine Fortune urged the councilors and the ward committee members to monitor the on-going road works in the municipality of Bo to ensure that a proper work is done.
According to her, they will be officially writing to the contractors to inform them about the visit of the councilors as they have the responsibility to monitor the road works, and called on the councilors to come with issues relating to the work.
Madam Fortune, however, said that some contractors are doing good work from the feed backs they are getting from the public and other councilors.
The acting Mayor of the Bo City Council, His Worship, Councilor David J.N . Smart said that the councilors should monitor and come with issues relating to the delay of work as this is raining season.
Speaking to this medium after the council meeting, some members of the public called on the Bo City Council to give the road contract to competent contractors and not to make allocations based on the ‘political pay back theory’.
They called on the Road Maintenance funds to empower the civil society and the media to do independent monitoring of the construction or rehabilitation of the pavement by the side of the road.
Some civil society activists urged the management of the Bo City Council to always involve them in the monitoring of the feeder road works, even though they are also doing their own work, but joint monitoring will instill fear in the minds of the contractors to do the right thing.
Reacting to the concerns of the councilors on the condition of anonymity, some of the contractors claimed that the attitude of some councilors is not good when they go to the work site, as they are not polite in asking questions relating to the work.