Former public officers who ended up before the court for State land giveaways

May 22, 2022 News

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==The Court Journal ==

By Renay Sambach

Kaieteur News – Last year, former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL), Colvin Heath-London, and Former Head of the Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission (GL&SC), Trevor Benn, were charged in separate matters involving State
land giveaways.

Today I will chronicle those matters.
In May 2021, the former NICIL boss was charged along with People’s National Congress Reform (PNC/R) member, James Bond; Director of A-Z Pharmaceuticals Medical Supplies and Equipment Inc., Eddie Doolal, and a principal of ARKEN Group Inc., Jermaine Richmond.
The aforementioned defendants were charged in relation to the prime state land giveaway at Plantation Peter’s Hall, East Bank Demerara.
Bond and Heath-London were slapped with three joint charges, while Doolal was implicated in a second joint charge and Richmond is implicated in a third joint charge.
The first charge alleges, that Heath-London and Bond, between August 1, 2017 and November 30, 2020, at Georgetown, conspired together and with others to defraud NICIL and its sole shareholder, the Government of Guyana, of property interest in land, namely the grant of a lease of land known as Plot A17, A18, and A19 Plantation Peter’s Hall, East Bank Demerara, owned by NICIL, without the necessary Board and Cabinet approval to do same and for purposes other than that of NICIL.

The second charge states, that Heath-London, Bond, and Doolal, between August 1, 2017, and November 30, 2020, at Georgetown, conspired together and with others to defraud NICIL and its sole shareholder, the Government of Guyana, of property interest in land, namely the grant of a lease of land known as Plot A7, A8, and A20 Plantation Peter’s Hall, East Bank Demerara, owned by the said NICIL without the necessary Board and Cabinet approval to do same and for purposes other than that of NICIL.
The final charge alleges that Heath-London, Bond, and Richmond, between August 1, 2017, and November 30, 2020, at Georgetown, conspired together and with others to defraud NICIL and its sole shareholder, the Government of Guyana, of property interest in land, namely the grant of a lease of land known as plot A1, A2, A3, and A4 Plantation Peter’s Hall, East Bank Demerara, owned by NICIL, without the necessary Board and Cabinet approval to do same and for purposes other than that of NICIL.
The charges were laid indictably and as such, the defendants were not required to enter a plea after the charges were read to them.
According to reports, Doolal and Life 1 Pharms Inc.’s Director, Avalon Jagnanadan, both leased acres of prime state land from NICIL, but transferred the state land at a price to Chinese National, Jianfen Yu.
It was further alleged that in another land deal, Richmond, on behalf of a company, also leased acres of land from NICIL. It is alleged that Bond received a payment from Trinidad logistics company, Lennox Petroleum, for the sale of several acres of the land that was leased to Richmond on behalf of the company.
The same company also sold the remaining acres of land to local logistics company, GLASS Holdings Inc.
This publication had reported that the government of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic, which came to office in August 2020, had insisted that it found a significant number of irregular land transactions involving state properties, including former sugar lands worth billions of dollars.
A number of companies had returned lands, which were supposed to be developed. In these instances, investigators found that NICIL, as the representative of the people of Guyana for the transactions, did not even collect all the money when it transferred lands into the recipients’ names.
In relation to the former GL&SC boss’ matter, he was charged for misconducting himself in public office by selling a portion of State land to Cevon’s Waste Management Inc. for $80M.
Benn, 53, of Century Palm Gardens, Georgetown, is facing three charges in relation to the illegal sale of State land.
He was not required to enter a plea to the indictable charge which alleges that between October 1, 2018 and August 31, 2020, at GL&SC, Georgetown, while being a public officer, he willfully misconducted himself by executing the sale of land – a parcel of Track ‘B’, Plantation Le Repentir, containing an area of 1.356 acres and being shown, laid down and defined on a sketch plan by Shaquille Mayer, Sworn Land Surveyor dated September 3, 2015.
The charge further alleges that Benn willfully misconducted himself without any excuse or reasonable justification, when he caused Cevon’s Waste Management Inc. to pay the sum of $80M to GL&SC for the portion of land knowing at the time that he did not have the authority to sell the said land.
This publication had reported that, on April 21, 2021, Benn appeared in court after he was charged for misconducting himself in public office by selling a portion of State land for four times less than its initial value. That charge alleges that between December 1, 2018, and August 31, 2019 at GL&SC, Georgetown, while being a public officer, he willfully misconducted himself by executing the sale of two parcels of lands, all being a portion of Middle Walk, Plantation Ruimveldt, Georgetown.
The charge further states that Benn willfully misconducted himself without any excuse or reasonable justification, when he caused Wilfred Brandsford, a businessman and former Director of the GL&SC, to pay the sum of $13.5M to GL&SC for the portion of land knowing at the time that he did not have the authority to sell the said land and knowing the plot had been previously valued at the sum of $60.8M. Benn’s conduct amounts to a breach of the public’s trust.
Kaieteur News had reported that Brandsford is the owner of Car Care Enterprise, and he allegedly benefitted from the sale of ‘severely undervalued’ land located at Plantation Ruimveldt, Georgetown. In fact, when the portion of land that Brandsford bought was compared to other similar land sales by the Government, it was discovered that Benn had allegedly sold the land for 10 times less than its actual value.
Also, on March 12, 2021, Benn appeared before City Magistrate, Leron Daly, for the alleged illegal sale of six acres of land and was placed on $200,000 bail for the offence.
He was not required to plead to the indictable offence, which alleges that between January 1, 2018, and March 31, 2020, at GL&SC, Georgetown, while being a public officer, he willfully misconducted himself by causing the sum of $27,000,000 to be paid by Janico Vide Industrial Engineering Limited for the lease of six acres of land at Plantation Ogle, East Coast Demerara, knowing that the GL&SC did not have the authority to lease any land at Plantation Ogle, East Coast Demerara.
The charge also allege that on March 27, 2020, Benn granted a Provisional Lease to Janico Vide Industrial Engineering Limited and willfully misconducted himself thereby leading to a breach of the public’s trust.
Benn was arrested on March 10, 2021, after a probe was launched into the alleged illegal land sale. It is reported that despite the fact that the lands belonged to the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL), Benn moved ahead to illegally lease the plot of land to a company called Janico Vide Engineering Limited for some $27M.
This publication had reported that the $27M transaction was made pursuant to a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), the company and the GL&SC signed. That MoU dictated that the engineering company would lease the land for 50 years and pay $200,000 per acre annually.
According to reports, Benn was appointed Commissioner of GL&SC in 2016 by the David Granger administration and was granted presidential powers related to the sanctioning of renting and granting of leases, licences and permission of occupancy of all public lands.
However, when the Irfaan Ali administration took office in August 2020, he was stripped of those powers and was later sent packing in November.
Following the revocation of his presidential powers, Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, S.C., had stated that his government would review all the leases, licences and permissions to occupy Public Lands granted by GL&SC after the No-Confidence Vote of December 2, 2018.
Notably, in May 2021, Vice President of the People’s Progressive Party /Civic (PPP/C), Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, announced that the government will move to settle with the principals of Cevons, Car Care and Courtney Benn services.
He had stated that the government will not pursue the unsuspecting businessmen, but the public officers who contracted the deals will be held liable. However, there has been no other announcement on the matter.

 

 

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