THERE can be no denying the successes of the massive housing development programme that is continuing apace under the current government.
Thousands upon thousands of Guyanese of all classes are in homes they have built on land allocated and developed around the country with huge sums also spent on basic infrastructure like electricity, water supply and roads. The establishment of housing schemes in which so many have made their homes is ample testimony to what has been achieved through the housing programme.
But there are some so blinkered to the positives of the administration that they seek to deny the concrete evidence before them.
The main opposition People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR), for one, cannot point to any outstanding housing programme initiated and established during its almost 30 years in government, even though it once paraded an ambitious Feed, Clothe and House the Nation programme that did not amount to much.
This government has made access to cheap and affordable housing another empowering tool to many citizens in its developmental thrust that seeks to eradicate poverty in the land.
The housing programme covers people of all income brackets — low and middle income groups included — and there surely can be nothing wrong with opening up new residential areas where some, including President Bharrat Jagdeo when he demits office after this year’s general elections, can build homes.
Yet there are some who seem to be suggesting that it is improper for Mr. Jagdeo and others in his Cabinet and government to be spending money on building their homes in schemes where they can be assured the privacy they seek.
The issue arose at the President’s press conference on Monday when he said he has paid a fair market price for the land on which he is building his home to afford him some degree of privacy and peaceful pursuit of whatever interest he will seek in the future.
The President said he paid $5 million per acre for his land in the new housing development at Sparendaam on the eastern outskirts of Georgetown, which, if translated correspondingly, would cost an approximate $500,000 for the same land in the low income developments.
It is regrettable that all kinds of sinister interpretations are transforming the need for homes for executives who have served the country, into a racist/capitalist context, despite the fact that those who will occupy the properties at Sparendaam cut across the social, political, racial and religious divides in this country.
Indubitably, President Jagdeo has served this country above and beyond the mandate of all the public offices he has held, and the least the Guyanese nation can do is to allow him to retire with grace into his personal life without a nasty quagmire of lies and innuendoes.