[wwwinewsguyana.com] – Trinidad’s Agriculture Minister Clarence Rambharat says his ministry will be conducting an audit of state lands.
In an interview yesterday, Rambharat said the audit would also include lands occupied by squatters and under agricultural production.
He said he planned to go on an outreach programme once the budget debate was over and would focus on a human resource review in his ministry. Rambharat said he also planned to review the operations of the ADB, Namdevco and EMBD.
President of the Agricultural Society of T&T (ASTT) Dhano Sookoo said she welcomed the audit.
She said, “We are the one who always call for audits, including an audit on the ASTT. We are prepared to present all our audited books at anytime to the ministry.”
Sookoo said most of the land throughout T&T under production was untenanted or what would be termed as being occupied by persons squatting.
Most of these land, she added, were lands once farmed by Caroni (1975) Limited and owned by the state.
“We support the minister in his audit of Namdevco, ADB and Caroni Green. The ASTT supported the minister when he terminated the contracts of personnel because many of these services done by contract workers should have been done by public servants already employed by the ministry. We would like to see any extra funds go towards infrastructure development for the industry,” she said. (Trinidad Guardian)
