At his press conference last Monday, President Jagdeo sought to address concerns over land at Plaisance which had been set aside for housing for him and senior government officials. He had been asked at the press conference if he was building a house there and how the land had been allotted.
The President replied that he had seen a lot of reports going around on this matter and that Stabroek News knew that he was building a house there and shouldn’t be asking. He then went on to point out that he had sold his property at Ogle and so he was now constructing another which would house a library, office and other facilities as he would be operating in the future from Guyana.
He went on to explain that “we’ve never gone to tender for land for housing, we tend to allocate these for housing once people are building structures” and volunteered that he had paid $5M per acre for the land which would translate to around $500,000 in a low income setting.
As to those who would be occupying the land the President said: “There’s some Cabinet members there, there are professionals there, people from the army, police, some regional chairmen, other groups similar to Pradoville one if, if you wanna, you’d say that so that is it but the lands were allocated to people in the Cabinet who didn’t have and stuff like that so I have to make arrangements, I needed more privacy too.”
Why President Jagdeo would presume that Stabroek News would know that he was building a house at Plaisance is uncertain. There isn’t exactly a sign outside whichever building he owns at Plaisance announcing that he was building a house after having purchased the lot in some publicly known process. Indeed, great secrecy has attended the divvying up of the land at what has come to be known as Pradoville 2 and the constructions thereupon. The President’s usually loquacious Minister of Housing, Mr Irfaan Ali has steadfastly refused several opportunities to speak on the apportioning of the land at Plaisance, the most recent being a letter by Stabroek News to him in December seeking information. Letters were also sent to the Chief Executive Officer of the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA), Mrs Mryna Pitt and Head of NICIL/Privatisation Unit, Mr Winston Brassington. Mr Ali and Mrs Pitt did not respond and Mr Brassington said that the questions should be directed to the Minister of Housing “since NICIL is not the competent authority to answer such questions.”
So there was no useful or authoritative information on this acreage up to last Monday and President Jagdeo’s answers to the questions asked at the press conference were the first real attempt at an explanation.
Unfortunately, his explanation didn’t pass muster and raises even more questions about the absence of transparency and the questionable deals that he has presided over as President of this nation.
The acreage at Sparendaam/Plaisance first came to public notice when the NCN transmission tower was relocated from that area to the West Demerara. One hopes that the tower was moved for better reasons than the assigning of the land to house the President and other senior government officials.
The public’s interest in the land really begins at the point at which the transmission tower was removed. What process or consideration led to the government decision to make land available for purchase by President Jagdeo and the yet unknown list of big-wigs? The President was silent on this but this is the crux of the matter as it exposes the murkiness and conspiratorial nature of government business in this country.
President Jagdeo cannot be unaware that in Georgetown and its outskirts land is scarce and many hardworking professionals, single mothers, retirees and growing families are looking for homesteads. Surely, as President of all of the people of this country President Jagdeo would have been acutely aware of the need for Solomonic wisdom in the apportioning of the land and the process handled in a transparent manner by the Ministry of Housing, the Central Housing and Planning Authority or the relevant local authority. There should ideally have been detailed consideration of whether this land was even appropriate for housing given its proximity to the Atlantic and the ever present threat of the rising seas which awareness the President himself has championed. The President surely could not have taken lightly the threat to that land but there is no evidence that there was any careful assessment of whether it was foolhardy to turn this land into housing.
So the decision was made to transform the land into housing, who then should benefit it from it? This is the nub of the matter. Had there been some public ventilating of the need for housing for certain Cabinet members and others perhaps the public might understand better what is now transpiring. Why should the President and an apparently handpicked list of supporters, confidantes and the favoured be able to take up this land at the expense of the so many other worthies? This is certainly not a working class government. It is a two-tiered administration. One set of the land for the salt of the earth – i.e. Tuschen, Parfait Harmonie etc and the plum spots for those who least need it but are “with” the government.
Whether he is President or not, President Jagdeo has no special lien on land for housing. The President already had access to land at Ogle on which a house was built. He decided to sell this spot for a hefty sum to a Trinidadian. Didn’t President Jagdeo plan his Ogle house in the manner that he is now constructing his new residence at Plaisance? The bottom line is the President had access to land at Ogle which he disposed of. He therefore should not be entitled to access to any other plot. He is also not in the category of the thousands of Guyanese who are living cheek by jowl with relatives or in dire circumstances and yearning for a plot of land somewhere. He will soon benefit from a sumptuous retirement package that Guyana in its present circumstances cannot afford.
How many lots the land at Plaisance could have been divided in, if properly deemed suitable for housing, should have been assigned in a publicly advertised scheme available to all Guyanese including the President and those now lucky to have already been granted spots there. It should not have been carved up in the manner that it has been where loyalty and friendship with the party and government were likely the overwhelming criteria. How can the public be sure that some of the allottees don’t already have state house lots? Were their names published in the press in the manner that those of ordinary persons are published so that the public could be called upon to clarify whether they were deserving of house lots? How was the price per acre arrived at and who made the decision?
Such shadowy decision-making is deeply offensive to openness, fairness and good governance. The government must still at this late stage explain to the public how the land was transformed into housing lots and how it was that certain regional chairmen, police and army officers, cabinet members and professionals were able to discover that they could purchase lots. Was it by way of Cabinet outreaches, a private party, a gathering at the Office of the President or through the old boys’ network? Whichever way it was it reeks and has the quality of a parting lassoing of prime state lands for the enjoyment of the privileged friends of the government.
It would also be of great interest whether this scheme is benefiting from utility and other services ahead of other deserving housing areas. The assigning of this Plaisance land is one of those decisions that a new government would be well in order to revisit.
