Govt. moving to compulsorily acquire lands for Wales gas project – Jagdeo  

Dec 20, 2022 News

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Kaieteur News – Despite a whirlwind of concerns regarding the safety and viability of the Wales Gas-to-Energy (GTE) project, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) is set on pushing the development forward and will soon move to compulsorily acquire lands from owners who refuse to comply with the process.

Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo at his most recent press conference, hosted at the Office of the President, was asked for an update on the land acquisition process when explained, “The Attorney General (Anil Nandlall, S.C) has been leading on this matter. He assured me that it’s moving apace and there are people who have signed agreements and there are others who are refusing to sign, they would have to compulsorily acquire.”

He added, “The deadline should have already been two weeks ago…Two weeks ago, we discussed this before I went off to Dubai. So we hope that it will be done.”

When asked about the total value of the lands that government will be paying residents for, Jagdeo said he would try to get the details shared with this newspaper, as it was not available to him at that time.

In September of this year, the AG met with about 25 landowners who received a proposal from the government to buy over part of their lands to facilitate the 12-inch pipeline to transport gas from the Liza Fields in the Stabroek Block to Wales, West Bank Demerara.

At that time, it was explained that works for the project were scheduled to commence in October, hence the need to complete the land acquisition process in a timely manner.

He was keen to note that in deciding on the route of the pipeline government ensured that it – as far as possible – fell alongside public lands so as to minimize the pipeline interfering with private property.

Importantly, he told Kaieteur News that the land was also demarcated with enough excess on both sides of the structure to create a “buffer” zone. This will ensure that private property is not affected when maintenance works are required, among others.

The landowners who received an offer for their lands are located between Nouvelle Flanders and Canal Number One. Nandlall said the next step would be to meet with land owners between Canal and Wales.

Each affected landowner received a document containing the name of the person, the area of the land, size of it and the value. According to the Legal Affairs Minister, “the idea is that the people will receive compensation at fair market value (or) at current market value.”

When asked if government will be finding lands to relocate the affected parties Nandlall said, “Different options are being explored but the underlying principle is market value and arriving at a consensual position with the people whether it’s money or whether it’s alternative arrangements can be arrived at but at the end of the day we want agreement. We don’t want disaffection.”

This publication spoke with a number of landowners who said they are not satisfied with the offer made by government for their lands. One farmer for example explained that the offer made did not take into consideration the earnings made from the property that would be affected.

The farmer told Kaieteur News, “I don’t think the valuation considers the earnings that we get from the land by planting rice. They just gave a flat value of that but they don’t consider that every month we earn on this land so they should consider how it would affect us when they take it away from us.”

A landowner in Canal Number One then explained that even though government will only require part of his land, his farming activity will be completely disrupted hence he does not believe he received a fair offer for compensation. The man, who is employed at a government office, asked to remain anonymous. He explained, “I am one of the land owners that will be extremely affected. According to what they are saying, it will be about six acres they need. My concern is, if you taking half of the land, I can’t do anything else on the other half. So it’s kind of pointless because they are saying, there will be a fence on either side of the pipe and they will have some sort of security or something so I would have to move off of the land because I can’t farm on it. I can’t live there, I can’t burn anything on the land because of the pipeline. I plant pineapples, tangerines, plantains and other cash crops. I born and grow there and my father got the land from his grandfather and so I am currently 29 years old. It will affect me a lot. I am looking forward to a call from whichever lawyer they say they are gonna propose to us but this offer, I can’t work with it.”

Also, the young man said he is fearful that a gas leak may occur and start a chain reaction; hence, he may be forced to discontinue his great grandparents’ legacy.

A female landowner who did not state her name shared, “we been living here we whole life. Now they just want come and disrupt your whole system. Not the entire land will be affected but still, you are being disrupted. Exxon had sent a young lady and I asked what would happen if it explode and they said it would be underground nine feet but I don’t know how much land they really taking but I am waiting on next week to hear what they would say.”

The GTE project

The GTE project will involve capturing associated gas produced from crude oil production operations on the Liza Phase 1 (Destiny) and Liza Phase 2 (Unity) Floating, Production, Storage, and Offloading (FPSO) vessels, transporting approximately 50 million standard cubic feet per day. It will entail three components inclusive of the pipeline, a Natural Gas Liquids (NGL) facility to treat and separate the gas and a power plant to generate 300 megawatts of electricity. The project has a planned lifecycle of at least 25 years. In ExxonMobil’s environmental studies for the project, it was clearly stated that the venture can result in chronic hardships for farmers. Nonetheless, Exxon has already received approval from the Environmental Protection Agency to commence the laying of the pipeline.

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