While the Linden Blue Lake investors have retained legal counsel and have written to NICIL about correspondence threatening to rescind the lease for the project, their attorney, Jerome Khan, believes that an amicable resolution will be had.
“I have written to his Excellency the President, David Granger, appealing to him to intervene and correct what is clearly an unfair and unlawful act by NICIL and its representative. He has responded and he said that he shall have the complaint investigated,” Khan told Stabroek News on Thursday.
“I believe that his Excellency the President is a fair and judicious man, and for that reason we have not commenced legal action and are allowing the investigative process to take place,” he added.
The company, Guyana Initiative Against Climate Change (GIACC), is headed by Director Sharon Benjamin-Fauconier, who says that no action has yet been filed in a court of law and that lawyers for both sides are talking. “Our lawyers are talking. Communication between lawyers is not the same as legal action,” she said, while maintaining that her company is on “firm” legal ground “as to the unlawfulness of this intent” by NICIL to threaten rescinding.
On the 12th of May, this newspaper reported that executives of the proposed mega ‘green’ project at Linden were bemoaning what they believed was a deliberate delay by NICIL in notarising and filing their lease agreement, although they have been paying rent for over a year.
The site referred to is a 503-acre plot of land bordering the Kara Kara Creek in Linden, in the vicinity of the popular mined-out pond known locally as the Blue Lake. It comprises depleted bauxite lands once worked by foreign and later state-owned bauxite companies.
Benjamin-Fauconier said that while some persons would have used parts of the now water-filled former bauxite pits to swim, they believe that the area could be transformed to produce clean energy, while they also want to set up a manufacturing entity which would produce and export fertilisers, among other products.
It was with that in mind, she said, that she applied to NICIL for the lease and was told that she had to submit a detailed proposal.
NICIL is the agency responsible for the lands. The lease with the company was signed under now deceased NICIL Head, Horace James.
Khan explained that the GIACC has had a “bona fide lease for 10 years”.
“Under the laws of Guyana-the Landlord and Tenants Act Section 6:1 of 61:01— any lease in excess of three years must be converted to a Deed of Lease. This is where the problem is we have, which was (an) intention on (the) part of (the) State to lease or to prepare the deed of lease to be executed by all parties and for it to be notarized and filed with the Registrar of Deeds. This was going to be done by the previous CEO of NICIL the late Mr. Horace James but then he became sick and subsequently died,” Khan said.
“After his death, my client has been attempting to get NICIL to prepare for execution, the Deed of Lease. So much so, an appointment was made by Mr. Colvin Heath-London for such a meeting to take place for execution of the lease on April 15th, 2019. Ms. Fauconier, her husband and her team arrived at NICIL headquarters with the understanding that they were going to sign and execute the lease at a date and time set up by Mr. Colvin Heath-London, to be told at 9:28 am— two minutes before the scheduled meeting— they were told that Heath-London was sick,” he added.
He said that he has summed up that the stalling of his client’s works is being done with an ulterior motive, although he did not say what that was.
“Based on my instructions, I am led to believe that there is an ulterior motive behind the refusal to prepare and execute the Deed of Lease and at the appropriate time this will be publicly ventilated,” the attorney posited.
But he vowed that he will seek all legal avenues to ensure that his clients are fairly treated. “The very day that the President wrote to me, NICIL posted a letter in Georgetown to my client advising that they intend to rescind the lease. I replied to that letter pointing out the illegality of their actions and to warn them that we will stoutly defend our clients’ legal rights in a competent court of law. This is the key point,” he stressed.
He said that, “In the meantime, however, we note that time is running against our client. Every day denied they are putting our clients behind”.
“At all times my client has been ready will[ing] and able to sign the Deed of Lease. It is unfortunate that GIACC has been subjected to such capricious conduct on behalf of NICIL and we hope better sense prevails and this is brought to a finality, sooner than later,” he added.
