Landowner threatens to sue judiciary for refusing case to eject squatter

A CHAGUANAS landowner is threatening to sue the judiciary over an alleged failure of the Chaguanas district court registrar to file, process, and hear an application to eject a squatter from his land.

On Tuesday, attorney Richard Jaggasar, who represents Ramdin Boney, gave the registrar 30 days to set a hearing of his client’s ejection notice application or a constitutional claim will be filed in the court for unreasonable delay.

Jaggasar said his client “has at all times behaved reasonably and attempted to utilise the facilities available to him namely the judiciary.

“However, due to the unreasonable behaviour of agents acting for the judiciary, he is left with no alternative but to bring this claim.”

Boney, the letter said, lawfully acquired the rights to a parcel of Caroni land in Chaguanas in 2021.

The attorney said when Boney visited the property he found a squatter occupying it.

In February, he tried to file ejectment proceedings in the district court. The letter referred to a series of e-mails exchanged between Jaggasar and court staff on the application. However, Jaggasar said to date his client’s application has not been filed.

He said the Summary Ejectment Ordinance mandates such applications to be filed in the summary courts, and with the pandemic and court rules, his client’s application was made electronically.

“To date, his request has not been processed.

The judiciary has therefore delayed unreasonably in the processing of his application and/or completely failed/neglected/refused to process an application for ejectment under the summary ejectment ordinance.

“Moreover, as a result of the judiciary’s continuous delay, he is restrained from expelling the current occupants of the property. This has caused him to lose income which he ought to be able to receive from the property.”