President should answer why he is engaging a corrupt Opposition Leader

President should answer why he is engaging a corrupt Opposition Leader – Jagdeo

Sep 16, 2018 News

Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo

Although facing pending charges over the Pradoville Two land deal, Opposition Leader, Bharrat Jagdeo, is getting set for formal talks with President David Granger.
Before those talks take place, Jagdeo, a former President is likely to be questioned for a second time by investigators from the Special Organized Crime Unit (SOCU), who have mounted new efforts to press charges against former Cabinet Members of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) administration.
On Thursday, Jagdeo brushed aside questions on whether he would attend the talks with Granger in light of the new moves by SOCU.
“I doubt he [Granger] wants to speak to corrupt people…He said he wanted an unbribable Commissioner of Police. The President likes to speak with clean people,” Jagdeo stated.
The former President questioned, “Why engage with a corrupt Opposition Leader?”
The intervention by former United States President Jimmy Carter led to a resumption of plans for the two leaders to meet.
Granger has proposed that the two discuss issues surrounding oil and gas, the environment and security.
Jagdeo is still to publicly indicate what matters he wants to place on the agenda. However, there are suggestions that the SOCU probe could derail the talks.
In the past few days, investigators questioned senior officials who were part of Jagdeo’s cabinet in 2010.
The main focus of the probe is the transfer of lands at Sparendaam to the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA), a road contract in the community to Atlantic Construction for $13.7M and the authorisation by the then Cabinet to have the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL) handle the transactions.
Those lands were converted into an exclusive community cynically dubbed Pradoville Two. The plots were sold, allegedly, below market value to mainly Government Ministers and others, who were handpicked by Jagdeo and his Cabinet.
State monies were used to develop the lands under questionable circumstances, SOCU is contending.
Jagdeo, who has built a mansion at Sparendaam, has told reporters that he refuses to pay any difference that investigators may determine after valuation of the property.
Instead, he is prepared for court.
The Pradoville Two lands, sold to Jagdeo and several Ministers of the previous administration were undervalued by almost 2,000 percent. They were sold at $114 per square foot. Independent appraisals have pegged the price closer to $2,250 per square feet.
At a rate of $114 per square foot, this would mean that Government would only earn a meager $74.5M for the entire 15 acres of land set aside at Pradoville Two.
Had government sold the land at the market value—as appraised by independent evaluators—it could have earned a whopping $1.4B.
This figure excludes the almost $300M, which was plugged into developing the project, monies expended by NICIL.

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