Hosein alleges corruption slowed Land Settlement Agency

SHAR­LENE RAM­PER­SAD

Se­nior In­ves­tiga­tive Re­porter

shar­lene.ram­per­sad
@guardian.co.tt

Land and Le­gal Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sad­dam Ho­sein says that, in the run-up to the 2025 gen­er­al elec­tion, Pa­lo Seco Agri­cul­tur­al En­ter­pris­es Lim­it­ed (PSAEL) was used to pave roads and build box drains.

Ho­sein was speak­ing dur­ing a meet­ing of Par­lia­ment’s Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee on his min­istry’s ex­pen­di­ture.

Op­po­si­tion MP Stu­art Young ques­tioned the $150 mil­lion al­lo­ca­tion to PSAEL in the 2027 bud­get. The com­pa­ny was moved to Ho­sein’s min­istry by the Prime Min­is­ter dur­ing a re­cent Cab­i­net reshuf­fle.

Ho­sein said that un­der the pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tion, PSAEL had one ma­jor in­fra­struc­ture project, di­vid­ed in­to two phas­es and car­ried out across Trinidad.

“The project scope was in­di­cat­ed for agri­cul­tur­al ac­cess roads, which then mor­phed in­to do­ing box drain and road paving in res­i­den­tial ar­eas in the lead-up to the gen­er­al elec­tion,” Ho­sein said.

“We have had a chair­man of this par­tic­u­lar PSAEL ... who was hand-se­lect­ing con­trac­tors, telling them, ‘Go and do work.’ There was no pro­cure­ment, there was no con­tract, and now we are be­ing sued to pay these peo­ple,” he added.

Ho­sein said the al­lo­ca­tion would cov­er ex­pen­di­ture un­der the project’s first and sec­ond phas­es.

“And I’ll tell you, one of your for­mer col­leagues, on the Fri­day be­fore the gen­er­al elec­tion, was bul­ly­ing pub­lic ser­vants at the min­istry to re­lease $40 mil­lion un­der this par­tic­u­lar project,” Ho­sein said.

“The Fri­day be­fore the gen­er­al elec­tion, the pub­lic ser­vants had to stop him be­cause when they ver­i­fied the projects, the projects were ei­ther in­com­plete, the projects may not have start­ed, and there were sev­er­al is­sues.”

He said the al­lo­ca­tion would cov­er work cer­ti­fied as com­plet­ed.

Young re­spond­ed that, in the run-up to the 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion un­der the UNC ad­min­is­tra­tion, leas­es were be­ing ex­e­cut­ed at the Ch­aguara­mas De­vel­op­ment Au­thor­i­ty (CDA) on elec­tion eve.

Ho­sein coun­tered with al­le­ga­tions that, in the run-up to last year’s gen­er­al elec­tion, the CDA ex­e­cut­ed leas­es with an at­tor­ney who had been ap­point­ed to a State board by the PNM gov­ern­ment.

Ho­sein al­so al­leged that cor­rup­tion at the Land Set­tle­ment Agency (LSA) had slowed the agency’s work.

He was re­spond­ing to ques­tions from Diego Mar­tin North/East MP Colm Im­bert, who asked why sev­er­al agen­cies had sig­nif­i­cant­ly un­der­spent in fis­cal 2026.

Im­bert cit­ed the Land for the Land­less pro­gramme, which he said had been al­lo­cat­ed $11 mil­lion but record­ed ex­pen­di­ture of just $3 mil­lion.

“That one stall for sure,” Im­bert said.

Ho­sein al­leged that cor­rup­tion at the LSA had slowed its op­er­a­tions.

“Mr Chair­man, when we went in­to the LSA, we had sev­er­al is­sues with re­spect to per­son­nel that was em­ployed at the LSA that were plant­ed there by the for­mer ad­min­is­tra­tion. Mr Chair­man, we had slowed down the work of the LSA sim­ply be­cause the work was be­ing frus­trat­ed by the mas­sive amount of cor­rup­tion that was ex­posed at the LSA,” Ho­sein said.

He read from a list of names he al­leged had been rec­om­mend­ed by PNM MPs, in­clud­ing one by Im­bert.

Im­bert protest­ed, say­ing the per­son named had been em­ployed by the LSA for decades and could not have been rec­om­mend­ed by him.

Com­mit­tee chair­man Jagdeo Singh in­ter­vened to re­store or­der.