NEWLY-APPOINTED Minister within the Ministry of Communities, Annette Ferguson, has cleared the air with respect to her owning a home.

Minister Ferguson said that allegations about how she acquired the property are totally untrue. She related that she applied for a house lot while in opposition. At that time, she only served as a Member of Parliament. During that time, she lived on her family’s property in Bourda, where she grew up. When she applied for her house lot, the Minister of Housing was Irfaan Ali.

She was given the offer to benefit from the housing solution in Eccles, EBD and decided that she preferred a plot of land to construct her own home. She was then told that she can be allocated a plot of land in Region Three; this offer she also rejected as she preferred to stay in Region Four. Minister Ferguson said that when her government took office and she was appointed junior Minister of Public Infrastructure, she pursued her house lot, as any other Guyanese would, and she said, “I was given the royal run around.”

When she was eventually successful with being allocated a 0.2525 acre of land in Georgetown, she then sought financing to build her house at a commercial bank. “I secured a mortgage, I have a mortgage that I am paying for, I don’t have three plots of land that is being peddled in the public domain. I have one plot of land and the acreage is 0.2525,” she said. “I have my mortgage. I am clean, I have nothing to hide,” she said.

More so, she said construction of the house commenced since 2016 and to date, “I can’t finish up to now,” she said. That is to show that monies are not flowing as is being peddled. Her husband is also the contractor of the house being built. The minister said that with all the fake news going around, she is more than happy that she received her plot of land before being appointed to the Ministry of Communities, with responsibility for housing.