St. John’sAntigua : Agriculture Minister Hilson Baptiste revealed that there is one issue that has plagued his ministry over the last eight years, a little known deal with a Trinidadian housing contractor that could cost Antigua & Barbuda millions.
“For the last eight years, this has given me more grey hairs than anything else,” was how the minister described a mid-80s transaction under the Antigua Labour Party administration that he said sold 70 acres of land in Lightfoot to developer Mongal Singh for a $1 price tag.
However, ALP leader Lester Bird said that although he was aware of Singh “building certain houses”, he was not aware of the price tag attributed, saying, “I don’t know anything about him buying the land for a dollar”.
The former prime minister could not recall the details of the Singh project and noted that he “was not dealing with housing” at that time and was not party to the deal brokering.
Baptiste said negotiations went awry with Singh at some point in time, leading to the contractor leaving the island with what he said was “millions of dollars from people for deposits” for homes and the deed to multiple acres of land. He also added that the original development agreement had “no recourse”.
Deepening the issue, according to the minister, was the assertion that the ALP then attempted to resell the lands that were owned by Singh, saying, “The bottom line is they throw Mongal out the island and the land that they gave the man they began to sell the same land to people. So Mongal filed an injunction.”
The minister said that Singh then sued government for “30 something” million dollars. Upon taking up his post in 2004, Baptiste said that he has been in renegotiations with Mongal and has been able to reduce the amount to nine million dollars—he hopes to further negotiate down to a four million dollar settlement.
He noted that in the settlement he has gotten Singh to agree to selling land under the condition that the developer return monies that he was holding for prospective homeowners who were banking on having homes, saying, “Quite a few got back money.”
However, he noted that now 20 to 30 people having now come on board attempting to seek deposit monies back from Singh too.
Baptiste called for government to agree to Singh “out of the equation, once and for all”, lest the situation get more “messy”. Referring, that fact that he believes “the man has a legitimate case” as 12 homes that he had completed are being lived in by squatters who have finished the unfinished homes and are living there free, in essence.
In another land case in the Follies government development, may be getting a price cut, depending on what Cabinet member decide once they go to the property site on Tuesday.
Ninety-eight plots of land were acquired by CHAPA in the Follies area “some years ago” to facilitate a development being built by developers from Columbia. Due to the global financial crisis, the contractors were unable to keep their end of the bargain and defaulted on their obligations.
Baptiste said he has organized the trip to view the 20-30 homes that were completed before the Columbian firm went bust.
“If Cabinet feels that we need to carry down the price, we can’t take down the price what you bought it for, but we can reduce the price of the land,” the minister said.
The two bedroom homes that are on a quarter acre of land and include infrastructure are currently priced at $205,000. He said the prices would be amended to allow “qualified” civil servants, police and nurses to buy homes, saying, “I’m proud of these developments that 20 years from now people are going to be happy they bought these houses”.
Baptiste said by Wednesday a decision should have been made.
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