Within a couple of months, 53 Enterprise, East Coast Demerara families will obtain the Certificate of Title for lands they bought over 20 years ago, according to the Department of Public Information (DPI).
This was the assurance given by Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall, SC at a community meeting on Saturday.
The meeting was the follow-up to an outreach held the previous Saturday with President Irfaan Ali and the Attorney General, DPI said.
The AG said that several issues hampered residents from having total ownership of their lands. He said the families had bought the lands through the Sugar Industry Labour Welfare Fund. However, GuySuCo could not transfer the lands to the Fund due to taxes owed to the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) and the local Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC), DPI said. This hindered GuySuCo from getting its compliance.
The AG said to date, taxes from the GRA have been waived and a limited certificate of compliance has been issued. He added that he is working to get the NDC to follow suit.
“Once the families get their Certificate of Title, they own the land, they own the property, they already have been living there, they have houses on it. They cannot go to the bank for a mortgage, they cannot pass the property on to their children, they cannot deal with the property because there is no title.
“So, the families are very happy this ordeal has finally come to an end and hopefully, within the next two to three months, they would be issued with their Certificates of Title”, he said.
Enterprise residents were elated by the swift intervention by the Government. Mr. Lokendra Persaud said he is happy with the way the issue is progressing.
“This has been a long issue. The residents went to several persons to have it addressed, but it was never addressed including former Prime Minister Nagamootoo… I am happy today that a timeline has been placed for the delivery of the titles and I am very happy that the AG has done great work,” he said.
Ms. Shakilla Prasad expressed similar sentiments. “He made so much good effort and we got good respond and he come back today to share with our people what is going on and I must thank him so much,” she said.
During the exercise yesterday, AG Nandlall was accompanied by representatives from GuySuCo, the Sugar Welfare Fund, the Deeds Registry and Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission.
The exercise is another example of Government engaging residents, listening to their issues and addressing them speedily.
