Guyana has enough land to provide house lots to everyone

Oct 05, 2020 Letters

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DEAR EDITOR,
The confrontation between several squatters on the East Coast of Demerara and GUYSUCO should have been avoided. The reason according to multiple sources is the extremely long waiting period for the residents in the area and across the country to legally obtain a house lot in Guyana. Indeed, it is far too long by any standards. It is shameful and downright demeaning and disrespectful to the residents in a country with one of the sparsest population density in the world to wait for years for a house lot. A comparison is noteworthy: Bangladesh with a physical size of roughly 57,000 square miles and a population of over 160 million inhabitants puts the Housing Authorities to shame in Guyana because it takes less than one-third the time as Guyana to process similar applications. Guyana Housing Authorities need to speed up the process. Housing has and continues to be one of the basic human needs in Guyana where there is more than enough land to provide house lots to almost every adult.
It is time for the government to modernize the allocation process of house lots in Guyana and get rid of the excessive burdensome paperwork, which has been overwhelming the staff at the Housing Authorities for decades. Equally important is the fact that the development and construction of some housing schemes are poorly planned and executed. As a real estate builder in New York City, I can firmly say that all housing units built in and around New York City and probably throughout the United States have to confirm to rigid building codes, especially in the areas of physical structure and electrical and plumbing.
It has been reported in Kaieteur News and other media outlets that many of the mistakes made in the construction of houses in Guyana can be avoided if planned and executed according to the strict guidelines, which many contractors have not adhere to. The reason is in their quest to build and complete as much residential houses as possible in the shortest possible time in order to make huge profits. Many contractors have cast aside or have totally ignored some vital areas in the country’s building codes. Further, the government of the day must ensure that all newly constructed residential housing schemes have adequate recreational facilities such as playgrounds and parks as well as schools and other amenities needed for the residents. Failing this, residents will have turn to nearby villages/districts for such services.
Then there is the problem when the owners of house lots have decided to embark on building their own houses and in some cases with unlicensed contractors in order to “cut corners” and save money. Not to mention that many of them have and continue to ignore the building codes. This is largely due to the fact that house lot owners are often pressured to build on the house lot given to them within a specific timeframe or else the house lot can be repossessed by the Housing Authorities. Construction and building experts have opined that the aforementioned scenario is perhaps one of the reasons for the poor construction of houses. It was said time and again that the rapid migration of skilled and qualified workers from Guyana has resulted in a severe shortage of certified urban planners, infrastructure engineers, architects and skilled construction personnel—all of which have resulted in the delay and poor construction of houses. And governments past and present have not been able to find a meaningful solution to the problems which have plagued the nation for decades.
The crux of the matter is plain and simple. The lack of effective zoning and the enforcement of building codes, robust inspections of buildings during construction, usage of correct building materials and qualified building contractors, have placed Guyana in the doldrums of progress. As a Real-Estate builder, I will conclude by saying that in Guyana, construction ought to be relatively straightforward, as the country does not have to contend with the yearly vicissitudes of temperature changes ranging from zero to over 100 degrees Fahrenheit like in North America. Obviously, the burden of having a wide range of materials to cope with the hot and cold weather is eliminated, along with heaters/furnaces to provide heat in the winter or materials like Styrofoam and fiberglass to insulate houses in order to maintain heat. I will also say that the government should not regularize the squatting areas mainly because they are poorly designed and rife with infrastructure deficiencies like drainage and wells. Simply put, superficial solutions to such serious problems will not work. It requires the use of proper building codes and modern and efficient designs of houses.
Leyland Chital Roopnaraine

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