Georgetown: The protests against the Marriott Hotel project smells “stink of racism and Guyana has never seen the level of what I call racism against a particular ethnic group and a particular nationality in this country,” Presidential Advisor on Governance Gail Teixeira said today.
Government has sought to justify the importation of Chinese workers to build the Marriott Hotel, saying that enough skilled workers were not available here and that the Chinese labour was thought more suited to complete the project in the time the Chinese contractor wants.
Teixeira, speaking at the PPP’s Freedom House Headquarters, said that even Guyanese contractors have been complaining of not having a reliable amount of semi-skilled workers, such as masons, plumbers, painters and electricians.
Attorney General Anil Nandlall also said hundreds of thousands of Guyanese working in all parts of the world cannot afford to take the kind of position as the protest against the Marriott.
The government has said it bargained with the Chinese contractor to lower its construction cost by US$9 million in exchange for freedom to choose its own workers, and so the Chinese workers were brought in.
The government also argued that employing a Chinese workforce was a better guarantee for construction at the rate the company would want.
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