The Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission (GLSC) Mabaruma Sub-District, Region One (Barima-Waini), is ordering residents of the Amerindian Community of Barabina, Region One, to pay for the lands they are living on since it is considered
Barabina Toshao Roxanne Skeete
State lands.
“They are not moving out anybody, we had a meeting in there where they came in and educated us about our lands. They explained to us that we are living on State lands and State lands are Government land,” Toshao Roxanne Skeete explained.
“We don’t have our titles for that community… so they advised us that all who want pay for their land they can go into the local office here at Mabaruma and do the necessary paperwork,” she further related.
Toshao Skeete said so far, many of her villagers have gone to the office and started the paperwork for land ownership. When asked about the legitimacy of the process, she said they are forced to follow the orders of the officers since they fear being removed from the community.
The residents are required to pay an application/processing fee of $2000 and up to $54,000 for plots of land they are living on. However, the officers informed residents that they are not required to pay the full amount at once and that payment plans are available.
However, the GLSC officers are being accused of entering the community without permission from the community council and are ordering residents to pay for the land plots they are occupying and which have been surveyed without their free, prior and informed consent.
The Barabina Amerindian community was established in the 1920s and has a sacred archaeological site.
According to Peter Persaud in a letter to the press, at the recently held Region One Toshaos Conference at Mabaruma, an officer of the GLSC from Georgetown made a presentation where he was informed about what the officers were doing in the Barabina community, to which he indicated that he is not aware of such operations.
Persaud said he is appealing to the GLSC to have its Mabaruma office return the monies taken from the residents. He added that the Barabina community, as well as other communities such as Koborimo, Smith Creek and Khan Hill, are now in the municipality of the Mabaruma Township without their consent, and no consultations were held with the Amerindian communities.
At its meeting, the Region One Toshaos Conference passed two resolutions.
One is that untitled Amerindian communities are no longer to be referred to as CDCs but as Community Councils, provided for in Sections 85-89 of the Amerindian Act 2006.
The other resolution is that the Amerindian villages and communities of Region One fully support the position taken by the National Toshaos Council (NTC) and Amerindian organisations in relation to the Lands Commission of Inquiry. Several attempts to contact to the Commissioner of the GLSC, Trevor Benn, proved futile.
