![\"\"](\"http:\/\/dominicanewsonline.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/commentary2.jpg\" "\\"Commentary\\"")
During the reign of the Dominica Labour Party in the 70\u2019s, Freedom Party in the 80\u2019s and the five-year term of the United Workers Party in the 90\u2019s there were many Road Maintenance Gangs providing casual labour repairing, patching and weeding theses major road ways leading to various villages in Dominica.<\/p>\n
These activities did not only provide jobs for the unskilled and unqualified citizens, but was a form of safety net, which helps alleviate poverty in communities. Many citizens who provided such labour included fisher folks (when the fishing season was slow), drop-outs from primary and secondary schools, to name a few.<\/p>\n
Income from such employment improves the lives of many families and contributed to the general economic activity of Dominica and also contributed to the income build up of the Dominica Social Security Funds. At the end of each fortnight there was a domino effect when these workers got paid from the government treasury, since there was a budget set aside every financial year to meet the cost of road maintenance in Dominica.<\/p>\n
Right now where is the economic activity which was generated by the contribution of such workers?<\/p>\n
Economic activity in the local economy and the Dominica Social Security Income Fund contracted when contribution from these workers were halted, because the present Dominica Labour Party Government from the inception of there reigns to power, decided to make Public Works Department (PWD) a quasi institution and in doing so blatantly ignore the Road Maintenance Unit of the PWD.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t get me wrong the reorganization of the PWD was a very good move, since there was too many wastage and mal-management of Government resources. With a proper strategic business plan making PWD a quasi entity could be a profitable venture, modeling on such recognized companies like Co Williams from Barbados and Eghill and Associates.<\/p>\n
During the making of PWD a quasi entity, the Government should have taken into consideration the road maintenance aspect of the PWD and create a Unit or a Department in the Ministry of Public Works with annual budgetary allocations, to be responsible for the traditional road maintenance programmed of the Government. Then the state of the roads leading to villages would not have reach the poor state they are in today and the protest action such as the one that was staged in the southern communities of Soufriere, Scott\u2019s Head and Gallion would have been avoided.<\/p>\n
The road maintenance activity created an avenue for many workers to contribute to the Dominica Social Security Income Fund and today many of the workers are retired and are benefitting from monthly income from the social security funds and therefore are not relying on the social welfare income nor the red clinic income.<\/p>\n
Many families went into poverty after the road maintenance aspect of the PWD was dismantled and communities which were very active economically due to incomes generated from the road maintenance unit of the PWD see businesses in these communities struggling to survive. There are other areas where economic activity was at high during the road maintenance era but time does not permit to highlight all.<\/p>\n
I strongly recommend that the present government examine the establishment of a Special Unit or Department in the Ministry of Public Works to deal with Road Maintenance in Dominica and get the Technocrats in the Ministry of Finance, Macro Economic Planning Unit to develop a Five Year Strategic Business Plan for the New Public Works Corporation.<\/p>\n
In summary the Road Maintenance Program did not only create employment for the unskilled, school drop outs, etc., but was a Safety Net for the Poor and the Vulnerable which created income to alleviate Poverty in the communities all over Dominica where such Road Maintenance Gangs existed.<\/p>\n
This article was posted in its entirety as received by dominicanewsonline.com. This media house does not correct any spelling or grammatical errors within commentaries. The views expressed therein are not necessarily those of dominicanewsonline.com or its advertisers.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"During the reign of the Dominica Labour Party in the 70\u2019s, Freedom Party in the 80\u2019s and the five-year term of the United Workers Party in the 90\u2019s there were many Road Maintenance Gangs providing casual labour repairing, patching and…","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_cbd_carousel_blocks":"[]","footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n