– Minister Ali“People thought we were joking when we said we would repossess their lands if they did not build. We were serious then and we are still very, very serious about the repossession process that we have started,” said Minister of Housing and Water, Irfaan Ali, recently.The Minister was at the time commenting on a question posed by this newspaper during an interview last week. According to the Minister, the repossession of house lots is crucial if the Ministry of Housing and Water is to raise the occupancy rate to 80 percent.He explained that if persons who have been allocated house lots since around 2000 or 2001 and have not commenced construction, they in essence have breached the agreement of sale. “It is clear that we have to repossess these lands and give it to persons who are in a more critical need. We cannot have an indiscipline system. The system must be discipline and serve to enforce the objectives of the policy which was and still is to ensure that those with the critical need have access to house lots.” It was for this reason the Minister noted that commercial banks have been afforded added capacities to give loans. As such, he noted that persons are being encouraged to go to the banks even as he urged that the banks be more proactive.The repossession drive commenced earlier this year and is set to continue, Ali said. Although unable to put a figure to the number of lots that have been repossessed, the Minister disclosed that some were already paid in full for, some were partially paid for while no down payment was made on others. According to him, whatever the amount that was paid would be fully refunded once a lot is repossessed.However, there are some persons, who have been responding well to letters of repossession,Wholesale Football Jerseys, Ali admitted.“If you go to Diamond (East Bank Demerara) it has brought tremendous success. There is a hive of activities there. People are taking the repossession notice seriously and they are working on completing their buildings.”Repossessing the house lots the Minister said is not merely geared at revoking citizens’ rights to house lots but rather to enforce the regulations and rules governing the allocation process.The Ministry is also addressing the fact that a number of vacant house lots are subjects of illegal sales where persons would have been granted house lots from the Ministry and opted to sell their rights and interests through various means. And this detection, the Minister said comes as a result of the field audits that were proposed and implemented earlier this year. “Now we are reaping the benefits and fruits of the field audits. The system is working and it is giving us real results. So we have a number of these cases that we have to deal with.”And according to the Minister, there is a pressing need for the media and other public commentators, who were speaking out about empty lots, to seek a better understanding of the policy that the Housing Ministry utilises.“Some sections of the media had reported that we are too aggressive in our actions but people have to understand what we are dealing with. Our main concern is that once the policy that we are implementing is fair, equitable and just then we are satisfying the criteria of public scrutiny,” Ali asserted.
