Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo has promised to restore the viability that small farmers within the Mahaica Mahaicony Abary-Agricultural Development Authority (MMA-ADA) once enjoyed, if the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) returns to office at next year’s March 2 General and Regional Elections.
In recent years, farmers within the MMA area have been facing hardships and are struggling to sustain their livelihood. First, the Agriculture Ministry made sweeping increases in land rental rates back in 2017. Land rentals went from $3500 to $15,000 per acre, which represented a 600 per cent increase and other rates from $1000 to $7000.
MMA/ADA Chairman Kelvin Saul
Then a few months ago, several cattle farmers were evicted from lands they had occupied for decades. These persons have been operating on the land, located at Blairmont, which covers 1360 acres, for the past 30 years and throughout that time, applications were filed for lease documents to be granted. However, the farmers received a notice from the agency earlier this year, indicating that they have to vacate the lands since new leases were issued to other persons, some of whom are not even cattle farmers.
Meanwhile, farmers who have applied for state lands to cultivate rice are being told no land is available.
But while this is happening, it was recently reported that the Chairman of the MMA-ADA, Kelvin Saul, has allegedly been the beneficiary of some 10,609 acres of land.
According to Jagdeo at this weekly press conference on Friday, this land is equivalent to 50,000 house lots – which the PPP promised to create if it gets into office. He pointed out that these lands are being given away at a time when the farmers in the area are struggling.
“How could the Chairman of your MMA Board get this when there are thousands of people who need land at MMA – small farmers and thousands of them who have had their lands taken away by the MMA. But here is the Chairman of the Board getting over 10,000 acres,” he contended.
Moreover, the Opposition Leader outlined that the party has also received information that an Alliance For Change (AFC) – the minority party in the coalition Government – member allegedly got over 400 acres of land there, and within a matter of weeks, he flipped it and reportedly sold it for $45 million to another person.
He went on to outline that not only is this a conflict of interest but it is happening at a time when applications of small farmers are stalled and thus their livelihoods affected.
“What about the lands taken away from farmers now because they can’t pay the $15,000 per acre fee that was increased from $3500. It has to do with a Government policy so you take away from all the small people who can’t afford and who are going bankrupt because they can’t afford to pay for all of these lands and then give it to one crony – 10,000 acres is a lot of land,” the Opposition Leader stressed.
He added that this “…is a policy of transferring resources to people, to cronies because of their connections or some of it could be parking of resources for Ministers and the others. We’ve seen a lot of people who are close to them, suddenly they are getting a lot of these resources and we believe they are parking these resources for after elections.”
According to Jagdeo, who is also the General Secretary of the PPP, these instances do not even “scratch the surface as yet” of the massive land giveaway that is ongoing throughout the country.
Nevertheless, he noted that while there is not much that the PPP Opposition can do right now, he assured that if the party returns to office next year, it will reverse these injustices to the farmers.
“We hope to rectify it after March 2, so you go back to ensuring that people get land and that we have enough land for the 50,000 house lots that we promised. And right at the MMA area, we take back the lease fees, the land and the water charges down to $3500 back again and we restore the budget to the MMA for farm to market roads and for drainage and irrigation, and so that those small farmers can earn a living too. That’s what we want to do,” he stated.
Not the sole owner
Meanwhile, Saul in response on Saturday said that in August 2014 himself and three other persons registered under the name Mc Agriculture Trading and Investment Services (MATIS) were granted a Forestry Permission SFP DEM 21/14 from the Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC).
The SFP DEM 21/14 is a block of approximately 10,609 acres of state lands lying on either side of Captain Creek in Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice), he said.
“This land was essentially Forest Land in the Hinterland and Intermediate Savannahs and MATIS focused on husbandry and harvesting of forestry products with charcoal production through systematic and sustained tree felling and land clearing. In January 2016 (MATIS) took a conscious decision to diversify into other related agricultural activities (Crops). The conversion from Forestry to Crops required the intervention/permission of the MMA-ADA and to this end, an application was submitted to the MMA in January 2016 to lease the said block of land for agricultural purposes,” Saul said in his defence.
He claimed that subsequently, the GFC which had granted the SFP in 2014, informed the Agriculture Ministry and the MMA-ADA on August 8, 2019, that it had no objection to the conversion and to the granting of a lease for the said land to MATIS by the MMA-ADA.
“I recused myself from the MMA-ADA discussions in 2016 on the conversion and in any event, I was not a member of that Committee that deliberated, nor was I the Chairman of MMA-ADA at the time. The MMA-ADA subsequently approved the conversion,” he claimed.
