Former Solicitor General, Elson Kaseke, has written the Government on behalf of Cheop Enterprises Limited, a company owned by Colwin Flowers, former City Engineer and City Administrator, to challenge Government’s move to issue letters of caution to lot holders in the Caribbean Shores area.
It was announced this week that the Barrow administration has moved on 58 pieces of land, encompassing large tracts of subdivided land just behind Universal Health Services (UHS) and the University of Belize (UB) in the Caribbean Shores area, as well as the Putt Putt land on Princess Margaret Drive, which have both been the center of controversy, particularly leading up to the 2008 general elections held two weeks ago.
On Friday, February 15, the Ministry of Natural Resources issued a press release saying that letters of caution have been issued to persons who have an interest in the properties. But today, former Caribbean Shores area rep, Joe Coye, who conceived the development project, told us that the matter is going to be taken to court.
According to Coye, ten of the people who have made down payments to Cheop Enterprises of tens of thousands of dollars on the lots have contacted him about the letters of caution. Kaseke will represent them and Cheop, the company that got the titles from Government for sale to the individual lot holders.
Undeterred by Government’s move on the lands, dump trucks and bulldozers continued to work in filling the area that was once merely swampland. When we visited the area today, they were leveling out the mangrove swamp and covering the area with sand.
Coye told us that UB had given over the lands to the Government, along with the Belize Technical College compound, in exchange for a piece of land in Punta Gorda and over a million dollars in funds to finance a university project. Cheop then acquired the lands (57 lots) from the Government, which, Coye said, the company purchased for $4,000 each, or roughly quarter-million-dollars total.
Cheop has been selling the lots to private individuals for prices ranging from $30,000 to $80,000, which Coye claims includes the land filling and infrastructural works – light, water, sewer, etc., plus an 800-foot access road acquired from Universal Health Services.
Teichrob and Sons (owned by a Mennonite, Peter Teichrob) is doing the land-filling and grading of the area, while Coye’s firm, Coye and Associates, is responsible for the accounting. The project, said Coye, began with surveys in 2006, but on the ground, works began last September, due to unexpected delays.
According to Coye, between 30 and 35 lots have already been issued, with individuals paying varied deposits on the land, some of them as much as 100%. Coye insists that the project was implemented above-board, and that it was not profit-driven, but implemented to give middle-class Belizeans land on which they could immediately build their homes.
But the current Barrow administration is calling the whole deal into question, and the project is now under investigation. At his first press conference after his swearing in, Prime Minister Dean Barrow said that Deputy Prime Minister Gaspar Vega, Minister of Natural Resources and the Environment, and his new CEO, David Gibson, along with the officials in the Ministry, would compile “a register of the most flagrant instances of the corruption that took place, especially in the last days, and we will proceed thereafter, to – where anything that was on the face of it wrong, and we have the legal means to do so – revoke leases and licenses, and where titles have been given, to compulsorily acquire properties that these people had no legal right to obtain; we will, in a word that dare I say, proceed to ‘quitar’ [Spanish, meaning ‘take away’].”
On Friday, February 15, 2008, the Ministry of Natural Resources issued a press release notifying that the Government is suspending the issuance of land tiles and lease hold documents for four weeks, until March 15, 2008.
It went on to say that, “…any grant fait not duly signed by the Commissioner of Lands and Surveys is null and void.”
They furthermore advised that no one should enter into any transactions involving the lands now under investigation – 57 lots in the Caribbean Shores division (parcels 4711 to 4767, and 4880 and 4881), which Government sources say formerly belonged to the University of Belize, and parcel 1077 in Kings Park, where the Putt Putt Bar and Grill is located.
On Wednesday, February 20, 2008, the Ministry issued another release indicating that the processing of leases and all private land transactions would continue, but that the suspension would remain for lands that were formerly national lands, anytime between 2003 and now.
Chief Executive Officer in the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment, David Gibson, told our newspaper Tuesday that over 20 letters of caution were issued to persons who had been involved in the land transactions.
“The letters caution these persons to refrain from transaction in, or developing these plots pending an assessment of the validity of tenure,” said the Ministry’s press release.
On Wednesday evening, Coye issued a press release condemning the Government’s actions.
“The PUP Caribbean Shores Constituency Committee condemns the decision by the new UDP Government to issue letters of caution to some titleholders within the division, and declares this the continuation of a malicious and vindictive political attack on Joe Coye and his family.”
Coye claims that “…there is no legal basis for this action, and that it is simply the perpetuation of the lies and dishonest statements regarding the University Heights land development project that was the center piece of the UDP’s 2008 General Elections campaign propaganda in Caribbean Shores.”
He insists that the persons who were given letters “…hold clear, absolute and indefeasible title to their properties, issued to them by the Ministry of Natural Resources, and conveyed to them through Certificates of Title/Land Certificates, and signed by the proper legal authorities, to wit, the Commissioner and the Registrar of Lands.”
Coye’s release goes on to say that the UDP’s actions are intended to defame him and his family, and he urges lease and titleholders of the lots in question to “…vigorously pursue every legal avenue available for redress…”
All our attempts to get further information on the transactions from the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Lands Commissioner regarding the lands have so far been unsuccessful, and our calls have so far not been returned.