QCOSTARICA – Wear on his relationship with different political sectors and the media prompted Carlos Segnini to quit his job as Minister of Public Works and Transport (MOPT)
In announcing his resignation, effective February 1, 2016, Segnini highlighted the achievements made by his ministry, and satisfactory progress especially in the areas of “pre-investment”.
“People want to see machinery but it is a mistake to start work without having everything ready. So the projects are delayed and become more expensive,” Segnini said.
During his time (in office since May 2014), the MOPT was unable to advance with projects such as the north portion of Circunvalacion (the uncompleted ring road around San Jose), the contract for the extension of Route 32 (San Jose – Limon) that is still in the Comptroller General’s Office, the construction of the new building for the MOPT after a series of errors and the announced (Nov. 2014) closure of the CONAVI, the roads council which has been heavily criticized for being ineffective.
Over the years, legislators and opposition parties have continually criticized the inefficiency of the MOPT. Recently, Marta Acosta, the Comptroller General said the MOPT is incompetent, something unchanged under Segnini.
Even MOPT employees have sent manifestos to the Media, as recent as in the days leading up to the Segnini resignation, that the minister himself is the saboteur in the administration.
Segnini, the eight minister to leave the Luis Guillermo Solis administration, dodged questions from reporters in the Wednesday afternoon press conference.
He should quit. Just take a drive past San Ramon where the dump trucks had messed up the bridge. They put in a new bridge and when you drive on the bridge or off the bridge you just about ruin your car because the left a big drop off. The road is paved good getting to the bridge. Then about 40 yards before you get to the bridge the pavement is all holes and not finished. Who would leave that job like that and not finish the work before opening the road back up. That is just crazy. Some one or somebody should be held accountable when you have these kind of problems. It would have been so easy just to finish paving up to the bridge. Now you have to bring all of the equipment back and wast money to finish the paving.