More West Berbice farmers await court’s decision

Removal from farmlands

…frustrations over reduced finances expressed

By Shemuel Fanfair

West Coast Berbice farmers Phillip Johnson, Rupert Blackman and Rawle Miller — the first farmers to have mounted legal challenges against the Mahaica/Mahaicony/Abary Agricultural Development Authority (MMA/ADA) cancelling State land leases granted them by President Donald Ramotar in 2014 and 2015 in the backlands of Seafield Village, West Coast Berbice – are pondering when a decision will be handed down in their matter.
Their anxieties in regard to this matter have been compounded by their leases being among those published in two schedules that detail the leases that have been cancelled; and they say they have been removed from the rice lands they had been occupying.
They note that six West Coast Berbice (WCB) farmers had mounted a successful legal challenge against the revocation of leases similarly granted them by former President Donald Ramotar for rice lands at Seafield and No 40 Village, and now retired Chief Justice Ian Chang had, in February 2016, quashed the cancellations in favour of those farmers.
However, those farmers had to again move to the courts, in April 2016, after President David Granger had cancelled the leases in March of that year. A newspaper publication had stated: “Notice is hereby given that His Excellency, the President of the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, has cancelled all State land leases as described in the Schedules.”
The matters of these three farmers were before former acting Chief Justice Yonette Cummings-Edwards, whose service was earlier this year elevated to acting Chancellor of the Judiciary.
Guyana Times understands that counsels for both sides — Anil Nandlall, representing the three farmers, and lawyers from the Attorney General’s Chambers, representing the MMA/ADA — have already tendered submissions to former Chief Justice Yonette Cummings-Edwards, and it is now left for her to give a ruling in this prolonged matter.
One of these three farmers, Rawle Miller, confirmed to <<Guyana Times>> on Tuesday that he and the other rice farmers are anticipating the court’s decision. “About a year now, [the judge] hasn’t given [us] any decision, and other farmers come after we and get their decision this month, and we still waiting,” he declared.
Miller disclosed that for the last crop he planted only two acres, whereas he would have planted four acres if he still had access to the MMA lands which were repossessed. He explained that this has brought about financial challenges that have befallen him and his family.
“We struggling in terms of getting money. They take away the land, we are trying to survive with what we can get. My wife [said], ‘Whatsoever you get, you have to make use of it’,” Miller explained, even as he disclosed that the Miller family has no intention of giving up hope. “Two of meh grandchildren [ages three and four] living with me, and they depend on me. The little you get you have to make do (with),” he noted in a softer tone.
Miller stressed that the farmers are engaging their attorney to get word on when the matter will move forward. According to court documents, this farmer is seeking $346,500 in special damages and continuing for every rice crop; while fellow rice farmer Johnson is asking for $692,500 and continuing for every rice crop, and Blackman is seeking $619,000 and continuing for every rice crop.
Acting Chief Justice Roxane George, SC, ruled on August 10 that the President’s revocation of leases for lands belonging to the other set of farmers — Brian George and Tiffany Hubbard; Vaughn Aaron; Joylyn, Gratien and Herman Nicholson, farmers who had moved to the High Court in May, 2017– was “unlawful, null & void”.
In her ruling, Chief Justice George determined that the leases constitute property under Article 142 of the Constitution, and the President’s revocation of those leases amounted to depriving the holders thereof of property without compensating them, as noted in Article 142 of the Constitution.
The Court further ordered that costs be paid to the six applicants in the sum of three hundred thousand dollars ($300,000) each. Those costs have to be paid through the Attorney General’s Chambers.