The Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA) is calling on persons to desist from occupying vacant, State-owned lands, and to ignore rumours that the Authority is currently allocating lands in Sophia and Cummings Lodge for $100,000.
These declarations were made during a press conference held by the Authority yesterday.
Minister within the Ministry of Communities, Annette Ferguson, told media personnel yesterday that she received a call from someone seeking to verify information passed to them. The person, a resident of West Coast Demerara, reportedly told the minister that they had been informed that the CH&PA is allocating lots in Sophia, and that an allocation could be obtained by going to the Authority with $100,000.
Ferguson also shared that a reporter informed her of cases where persons have been presented with slips of paper purportedly issued by the CH&PA, which purport to vest title in the land to the persons the land has been given to. According to Ferguson, this information, and the documentation are false, and should be ignored.
Land grabbing
Ferguson also told reporters that the Authority was recently made aware that persons have been occupying empty lots in Sophia and Cummings Lodge.
CH&PA Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Lelon Saul, shared with reporters that such misinformation and undertakings normally occur around an election, adding that persons tend to advise others that if they occupy State land during an election, they will not be removed.
Saul pleaded with members of the public to resist the practice, and reminded the public that doing so is a criminal offence.
Ferguson said that to address the issue, CH&PA representatives were dispatched to the areas in which persons were illegally occupying State lands. She said that those persons were informed of the Authority’s position, and, where they expressed an interest, they became registered to eventually receive an allocation.
Saul explained that while the Authority understands the need for people to be properly housed, such housing must be done in a systematic and structured way. To this end, he said, the Authority is working along with the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Inc (NICIL), Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission and the Guyana Sugar Corporation, from which lands are bought for development, and eventually, allocation to Guyanese to meet their housing needs.
