CJIA runway extension draws closer to Timehri homes

Apr 22, 2014 News

… farmers allege ‘bullyism’ by Soesdyke businessman
Concerns are again growing among residents of Timehri North as the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) runway expansion inches closer to residents’ homes.
In some cases, where houses are in the direct path of the ongoing works, the contractor skips that section and the activity continues to its back and sides.
Apart from what the residents say are direct threats to their homes, farmers in the community are complaining that not only have they been displaced by the expansion project, but they are now being bullied by a businessman who claims to have legal documentation for land in another area of the community.
A visit to Timehri North showed that the airport expansion is within several feet of the residents’ homes, and has completely taken over the community’s eastern farm lands. One home owner said that the Chinese workers had initially told residents that they were taking only a few feet of land to conduct their work.
“Now everyday they are drawing closer and closer to our homes.”
Another resident asked what will become of his home since clearing works for the runway expansion have commenced behind his house. Several homes believed to be in the direct location of the project, stand in the middle of cleared out areas, and according to residents it is only a matter of time before they are forced to evacuate their houses.
A famer said that before the work came close to the residents’ homes, he was being asked by the Chinese workers for a few yards into his farm. He said that he was assured that his farm would not be a problem.
However, as the work progressed, “the Chinese workers dug deeper and deeper into the farm until it was completely gone,” the man said.
Several community farmers say that they are being limited to a certain size of farm land by this popular businessman.
One of the affected farmers told Kaieteur News that after the destruction of several farms during the commencement of the CJIA project, a number of farmers went in search of new farming grounds and restarted their livelihood.
Sometime later, they alleged, the businessman came to the said area and created a boundary, which he warned farmers not to cross.
The farmers claim, also, that the man has used his means to hurriedly clear the new land, before claiming the majority of it even while protestation against this act of “bullyism,” ensued.
The residents alleged that the businessman, using large chucks of wood and debris from the cleared out land, blocked the tiny stream that fed the farmers’ crops before redirecting the water to flow to feed only into his farm.
Additionally, the farmers vented, the named businessman who is a relatively new resident to the Soesdyke community, has cut an almost two-mile foot path from the Base Road in Soesdyke, leading all the way to the Timehri community.
This has caused security concerns among the residents.
Kaieteur News was however unable to make contact with the businessman at the time of the visit or the report.
Executives of the Timehri North Community Council have also condemned the continued destruction of the farmers’ property and have reiterated calls for complementary relocation sites and compensation for both residents and farmers.
The Council says, “Not only has the destruction of millions of dollars in cash and permanent crops by the government on the farmers of Timehri North been brushed over; now the unrepresented work of the government is finding its way, into the land space next to the homes of residents, an imposition by the PPP government who continues its effort to uproot a community of over 400 households.”
Farmers have also called on the relevant authorities to look into the businessman’s alleged land ownership since according to them, Public Works Minister Robeson Benn had told residents that they were occupying state land.
The farmers said that the businessman refuses to provide evidence of the land ownership.

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CJIA runway extension draws closer to Timehri homes

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