By Bennette Roach
When Her Excellency the Governor during her press confdrence earlier today mentioned, “…we have some good things happening here and we can and in my view – (should) focus on making these happen in the interest of people of Montserrat and Montserrat’s future,” there was the temptation to ask her later to give an idea of those things.
But Martin Dawson DFID’s country representative very shortly after provided the ‘good’ news. He was asked for an update on fibre optics which we know have been featured as one of the economic spring boards for Montserrat along with geothermal and tourism development, the last lying dormant for five years before.
It was indeed very good news for the communication sector on Montserrat, as Dawson said he was pleased to announce there has been approval of the fiber optic project for the island, adding that the pre-qualification stage of the procurement process has already started.
“So those bids will be going out as a pre-qualification questionnaire to the market,” he said. But as has become the custom that procurement process using local media for advertising, as most likely should be a part of the preparations, Dawson continues. “So if people are interested to look at the DFID portal to check on procurement process and the market will then respond to that pre-qualification, which would be due back into DFID on 22nd August.
Geothermal update:
As preparations for drilling a third geothermal well just south of the Week’s area above the Cork hill main road almost under St. George’s Hill, there comes further good news at the Governor’s press conference as Dawson reported, “Geothermal is going very well.”
He said he was unable to give an exact date of the arrival of the drilling rig, “but I know the rig is on its way across the Pacific and they did encounter some bad weather around the Philippines area.”
“I anticipate that the drilling rig group will arrive on the island sometime mid-August around about the 20th,” he said.
