PM: THA premature on land acquisition for airport terminal

Acquisition of lands for the construction of the new airport terminal in Crown Point will be done in a civilised, sensible and professional way, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley, said last Thursday at ‘Conversations with the Prime Minister’ held at the Scarborough Library.

On May 14, the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) and the Airports Authority held a public consultation at the Rovanel’s Resort on Store Bay Local Road, announcing then that Government was seeking to acquire 84 acres of land in the area to build a new airport terminal, and that construction was to begin in December.

Last Thursday, Rowley said the THA’s public consultation was premature.

“If I am to be honest with you as I should be, and I must be and it is the only way that I know it… there has been some premature, so-called consultations on that matter.

“We went out to the public before the information was available and the public quite rightly asked questions that could not have been answered by those who went out there,” he said.

Rowley said central government discovered that there was a point of view that all the lands between the current terminal building and the end of the airport runway was to be acquired for the project.

“The position of the Government and we are working with the THA on that and I think we are on the same page with that now… we are only acquiring lands that is required specifically for the development that we are going to be doing now. We are not acquiring one foot of land that we do not need for the development project that we would have agreed upon initially when the engineer signs off on it.

“That means, all those people who were disturbed on the entire length, it is only a portion of that which is required and those in central government and in Trinidad, we were surprised by this development in Tobago,” he said.

The PM terminal building will be constructed under a BOLT (Build Own Lease Transfer) agreement, adding that the implementing agency was the National Infrastructure Development Company (NIDCO) and arrangement for the funding was to be done by the Ministry of Finance.

The THA, he said, is involved in the whole question of what will be built, as well as how the work will proceed.

“The size I cannot tell you that, NIDCO will determine that, that would be determined by what we are going to build. We are still in the process with the consultants of determining what we are going to build. So, if we have not finalised the terminal building itself, we certainly cannot finalise how much land we want, if we are going to confine ourselves to acquiring just what we need.

“But some persons went out and said that we are going to be acquiring all the lands… that is not known to us,” he said. Rowley stressed Government would not be engaging in any blanket acquisition, that lands would be acquired just for the development.

“The acquisition of lands, if it is private lands to be acquired and to be paid for by public monies, it can be done in two ways. If the THA has cash that they have in their hands, they are legally entitled to go and buy lands from people, they have done it before. I don’t know that they have any cash now to go and buy any lands from anybody.

“Secondly, if the lands have to be acquired under the Land Acquisition Act, that is only a matter for Parliament. So, how are we going to do it… I am not aware that the THA has any cash to buy any lands from people, I am aware that the authority to acquire lands is a Parliamentary process and the Parliamentary process is a central government initiative,” he said.

He added: “In the very near future, we are going to restart that process and that gap that developed between May and now will disappear. We would seek to acquire a parcel of land to build the terminal building and whatever carparking is required and that is all that we are going to acquire.”

At the May 14 consultation, THA Chief Administrator, Raye Sandy had said that 120 residents/landowners would be affected as the government is looking to compulsory acquisition of 84 acres of land in the Canaan/Bon Accord area to build a new $500 million terminal for the ANR Robinson International Airport.

“Those persons whose land are to be acquired, and in a general sense, we are talking about lands that starts south of the Store Bay Local Road between Gaskin Bay Road on the east and Store Bay Feeder Road on the west, that is the parcel of land that is earmarked for acquisition for the construction of this new airport,” Sandy had said.