by Eulana Weekes
St. Kitts and Nevis (WINN): The Alexandra Hospital expansion looks beautiful on the outside, but yet to be completed on the inside confirmed Hon. Mark Brantley, Premier of Nevis.
“On the outside it looks absolutely phenomenal, because we have decided that what we will do is to improve the esthetics because all the work now to be done is to be done on the inside” the Premier stated.
Brantley added “The advice we got from the contractors is[that] they wanted to close up the building, meaning to put in windows and doors, because a lot of the interior is going to be sheetrock or drywall. They are saying they don’t want it to be open to the elements.”
Responding to the media at his Monthly Press Conference in January, Brantley said his desire is to have the edifice completed this year but the contractors however are in doubt.
We are building out the infrastructure. I have said to them ambitiously that I would like for it to be delivered this year. The contractors don’t feel that that is going to be entirely possible; but the idea really is that we are going to work on it and to provide regular updates.
The Premier of Nevis will deliver the 2023 Budget Address for the island of Nevis on February 20, 2023. The budget allocation for the completion of the Alexandra Hospital Expansion Project will be debated upon in Parliament.
“We have had thus far one meeting with the new Minister of Health- Hon Jahnel Nisbett and her team and the contractors [who] were there explaining what needs to be done. Part of it is the budgetary process. Of course, we haven’t yet had the new budget, but I can assure the public that we will be allocating a significant sum to do the balance of work that needs to be done.”
During the campaign period for the Nevis Island Assembly elections there was much chatter and discussion about the hospital expansion project. Some individuals claimed that the painting of the outside of the building was a sham, to cover up a project that seemingly had gone wrong.
Premier Brantley in a brief conversation with a WINN FM reporter said the project was on pause to facilitate the reconfiguration of the building’s interior.
The Alexandra Hospital Expansion Project broke ground in May 2017 with a $19 million budget allocation.
