One of the thorniest subjects to emerge thus far from the public hearings
of the DFC Commission of Inquiry is the issue of the disputed ownership of the
land on which Mahogany Heights sits. We broke the story in April of 2005 when
businessman Johnny Kuo, who is the rightful owner and title holder advertised
the land for sale. Government had bought the land from Abdul Hamze for $9 million.
It was according to government assessors, a gross overvaluation, but still he
failed to pay Kuo a $2 million on it. Today the upshot of all this is that the
homeowners at mahogany Heights are still living in limbo as they cannot get
titles for their property because it is under claim. Now, the DFC hearings have
revealed that government first became aware of the major mix-up in April of
2003 but continued to pay Hamze until the end of 2004. That's just one of the
recent revelations about Mahogany Heights. Another showed that when it opened,
the city was, to some extent, a facade, an allegation flatly and energetically
deflected at that time by point man, Minister Ralph Fonseca. For context on
this one, we take you back to 2003.
Jules Vasquez Reporting,
On February 7, 2003 this was the Mahogany Heights Alfonso Noble introduced you
to:
Alfonso Noble,
"A city far from being complete. The inside of the houses show exposed
walls with absolutely no interior work. There are broken windows in almost all
the houses. The doors are not properly fitted to the houses. There are no locks
and no utility connections. No infrastructure in place, there are only pits
that look like drains. There are no electricity poles, no water connections,
and there is building debris everywhere. The place seems to be in total disorder."
But two days after that story aired, point man on the project Ralph Fonseca
called our report "desperate" and cheap when he declared the city
open.
Hon. Ralph Fonseca,
[2003] "Desperate people without vision and naysayers criticized,
bashed, and predicted nothing but doom and gloom...Some of them sneaked in here
like thieves in the night with cheap cameras and took pictures of houses still
under construction...Once again to the critics we say look around, the work
completed out here at this new city speaks for itself."
Only if he meant double-speak, because now the DFC Commission of Inquiry has
revealed what really was happening beyond the velvet rope at Mahogany Heights.
It was a city that was far from being ready and some of it needed much more
than a touch-up.
Merlene Bailey-Martinez,
"There was an inauguration of Mahogany Heights, I think in the Board
of Directors meeting, on 8th of February 2003 but on the 26th of February 2003
the Board approved $165,000 to CAD Construction for remedial works. This is
three weeks after the project opened. Actually it had mentioned of putting pipes
and putting in lines for the sewage system or the plumbing and those seem to
be fairly a given that you would have those in and at the standard that you
want. Why was there then so much by way of remedial works that needed to be
carry out after the project was inaugurated?"
A question that we first asked in 2003 and only now, three years later are
we coming close to the answers.
According to Commissioner Bailey-Martinez, CAD Construction which got
the project to do the refitting, is owned by former DFC Deputy Chair David Courtenay.
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