HONIARA City Mayor Eddie Siapu has highlighted some of the municipal authority’s areas of needs to the visiting delegation from the Jiangmen City Municipal Authority of China’s Guangdong Province.
Honiara City and Jiangmen signed a Sister Relationship Memorandum of Agreement on 19 May 2022 and the areas of needs raised by Mayor Siapu were intended to be addressed under this sister relations framework.
These areas of need include HCC’s plan to revive its Road Construction and Maintenance Department as well as short-term training attachments for HCC officers with the Jiangmen City Municipal Authority and Jiangmen City Municipal Authority’s deployment of technical experts to HCC.
Mayor Siapu said, for the accomplishment of the Road Construction and Maintenance Department revival, HCC plans to procure and have a fleet of road construction and maintenance machines such as bulldozers, excavators, motor graders, loaders, dump trucks, dump rollers, road sweepers and so forth.
He said, in the spirit of the Honiara City-Jiangmen City Sister Relationship MOA, the two municipalities can explore a cooperation to materialize this HCC plan.
“One of the fields of cooperation agreed to in the sister relations agreement is urban construction and management. I believe you have seen for yourselves, the road condition in Honiara City. Secondary roads in the residential areas are in worst states and conditions.
“My government kindly requests the assistance of Jiangmen City in reviving its Works Department to be able to respond to the needs in road construction and maintenance.”
Mayor Siapu said this will provide easy access to residential areas for waste collection, health services, law enforcement, educational services and other council activities,” Mayor Siapu said.
On the needs for short-term training attachments for HCC employees with the Jiangmen City Municipal Authority and deployment of experienced professionals from Jiangmen City to provide technical assistance to HCC, the mayor said these should be pursued and addressed in the spirit of people-to-people exchanges in line with the MOA.
In response, the Chairman of the Jiangmen Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and head of the visiting delegation, Zhang Lei acknowledged the issues of need presented by Mayor Siapu and assured him and his Executive that he and his delegation will take them back home for discussions.
At the same time, Mr Lei suggested that HCC draw up a plan for the deployment of technical experts from Jiangmen and also a plan outlining the list of equipment and machineries required so as to guide the Jiangmen Municipal Authority on what to do in responding to the needs raised.
“I suggest that we have a plan in terms of the deployment of technical experts. For example the areas of training need, how many technical experts are needed, what time will they come and for how long. We need to have a timetable for that.
“In terms of the city management, it would involve some equipment and machines. So, we would also want to have a list or plan to show us what equipment and machineries are needed.
“When we go back, we will report these issues to the head of our municipal government or mayor and we will try our best to push for their resolution based on our sister relations framework.”
Further to the discussions, Mr Lei handed over a ceremonial key for two donated vehicles to HCC from the Jiangmen City Municipal Authority.
Mr Lei and his delegation also held similar discussions with the Guadalcanal Premier William Atu and his Executive on Thursday, after which they handed over sewing machines to the premier for distribution to women’s groups and schools in Guadalcanal Province.
The delegation is also meeting with Chung Wah School representatives and will also handover donated items from Jiangmen City Municipal Authority to the school.
By DELI-SHARON OSO
Solomon Star, Honiara
