LSA warns against misleading social media ads selling squatting land

The Land Set­tle­ment Agency (LSA) is warn­ing mem­bers of the pub­lic not to be mis­led by so­cial me­dia ad­ver­tise­ments pro­mot­ing the sale of “squat­ting land” in Va­len­cia while claim­ing buy­ers can ob­tain a Cer­tifi­cate of Com­fort (CoC).

In a me­dia re­lease is­sued on Fri­day, the agency said the ad­ver­tise­ments con­tain false and mis­lead­ing in­for­ma­tion and urged prospec­tive buy­ers to avoid mak­ing pay­ments or en­ter­ing in­to agree­ments based on such claims.

The LSA stressed that a Cer­tifi­cate of Com­fort is not trans­fer­able and can­not be bought, sold, as­signed or trans­ferred from one per­son to an­oth­er. It ex­plained that the doc­u­ment is is­sued on­ly to an el­i­gi­ble ap­pli­cant un­der the State Land (Reg­u­lar­i­sa­tion of Tenure) Act.

The agency al­so re­mind­ed the pub­lic that ap­pli­ca­tions for Cer­tifi­cates of Com­fort closed more than 20 years ago.

To have qual­i­fied, an ap­pli­cant must have sub­mit­ted an ap­pli­ca­tion on or be­fore Oc­to­ber 27, 2000, and been oc­cu­py­ing a dwelling house on State land on or be­fore Jan­u­ary 1, 1998.

The LSA said the statu­to­ry dead­line for ap­pli­ca­tions has long ex­pired and it has no le­gal au­thor­i­ty to ac­cept new ap­pli­ca­tions or ex­tend the ap­pli­ca­tion pe­ri­od.

“As such, any rep­re­sen­ta­tion that a pur­chas­er can now ob­tain a Cer­tifi­cate of Com­fort is false and mis­lead­ing,” the agency stat­ed.

The LSA fur­ther cau­tioned that the un­law­ful oc­cu­pa­tion, sale, pur­chase, trans­fer or al­lo­ca­tion of State land is il­le­gal and could re­sult in in­ves­ti­ga­tions and pros­e­cu­tion un­der the laws of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

It urged mem­bers of the pub­lic not to make pay­ments or sign agree­ments based on ad­ver­tise­ments of­fer­ing squat­ting land for sale or promis­ing the ac­qui­si­tion or trans­fer of a Cer­tifi­cate of Com­fort.

The agency said any­one con­sid­er­ing a trans­ac­tion in­volv­ing State land should first ver­i­fy the in­for­ma­tion through the Com­mis­sion­er of State Lands or the Land Set­tle­ment Agency.

The LSA said it re­mains com­mit­ted to pro­tect­ing the pub­lic in­ter­est by en­sur­ing that all mat­ters re­lat­ing to State land are ad­min­is­tered in ac­cor­dance with the law.

The warn­ing comes amid the cir­cu­la­tion of on­line ad­ver­tise­ments tar­get­ing prospec­tive buy­ers with claims that they can se­cure own­er­ship or le­gal recog­ni­tion of oc­cu­pied State land through the pur­chase of a Cer­tifi­cate of Com­fort, de­spite the pro­gramme hav­ing been closed for more than two decades.