PM: Govt may go along with THA to acquire Pigeon Pt

Prime Minister Patrick Manning said yesterday that Government was “likely” or “minded” to go along with the request of the Tobago House of Assembly to compulsorily acquire the land strip of land that adjoins the beach front at Point Pigeon Beach Resort.

The Prime Minister, speaking at a news conference at Whitehall, said that while it was never government’s intention to put the Pigeon Point Beach Resort “out of business,” it may be that the company which owns the Resort — the Ansa/McAl Group — may decide that their property is useless without the beach strip. “It is not expropriation. It is acquisition under the law with appropriate compensation,” Manning stressed, adding that under the Land Acquisition Ordinance, the State had the right to take over any property for public purposes, once the owners are properly compensated. “The Government is not going to act high-handedly...even if we have to acquire (land) compulsorily there is a proper way for doing so,” he said in response to comments that it might send a bad signal to the investor community.

While he stressed the Cabinet was yet to adjudicate on the matter, Manning said the issue had been the subject of long and protracted negotiations and that compulsory acquisition would only been contemplated because all else had failed. Manning said when the proposal to acquire the land had first come one year ago, government turned it down in favour of negotiations. He said if government accepted such a proposal now it would be after all other mechanisms had failed to produce an acceptable result. “I can tell you we have gone out of our way,” he said, recalling that a Ministerial team had been established last year which tried to mediate between the two parties. “If the State chooses to go the route of compulsory acquisition, it would have been a last resort,” he said. He said such an acquisition would be no different from any of the other motions which come before Parliament to acquire a property.

Told that the State had a terrible record in terms of paying landowners for property which is compulsorily acquired, Manning quipped: “the Minister of Foreign Affairs (Knowlson Gift) would be among the first to agree with you”. He said the Government was trying very hard, in terms of the financial resources available to it, to change that image. The public purpose for which the land would be acquired is for fishermen to have access to the beach, he said.