Dear Editor,
One wonders if this National Housing Trust (NHT) Outameni purchase was, in fact, a bailout, since the NHT has no interest in competing with or pre-empting any possible purchasers of the property.
I stand to be corrected, but the property should have been put up for sale by the owners to the private sector and allow the market to offer an appropriate price. It would be up to the owners to make the most prudent decision how best to dispose of the asset, at which time the Government could become interested.
As long as the property is activate and functioning it should not matter who are the operators as it would be another attraction available to the tourism sector. In any event, a purchase of this nature should have been done with the full knowledge and consent of the prime minister, and possibly the Cabinet. It demonstrates a serious state of disconnect for a purchase outside of the core business of the NHT to come to the knowledge of the Prime Minister, and possibly the Government, in the way it did.
The property is now owned ostensibly by the NHT and with the level of dissenting voices and concerns about the purchase the Government should seek to bring an amicable settlement to the matter.
The property could be placed on the market with a reasonable period allowed for interested purchaser to make offers. If no reasonable offers are forthcoming in this period then a land swap could be arranged with the Government providing land to the value of the purchase price of the Outameni property to be exchanged with the NHT for the Outameni property.
This way the NHT would be provided with land that can be used to provide housing solutions for needy Jamaicans. The Outameni property could then be held by the commissioner of lands and managed, for example, by the Jamaica National Heritage Trust, which could then be leased to serious long-term business operators with the investment being recovered over a realistic timeframe.
Orlando Dyer
Kingston 6
Let's salvage the Outameni purchase
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One wonders if this National Housing Trust (NHT) Outameni purchase was, in fact, a bailout, since the NHT has no interest in competing with or pre-empting any possible purchasers of the property.
I stand to be corrected, but the property should have been put up for sale by the owners to the private sector and allow the market to offer an appropriate price. It would be up to the owners to make the most prudent decision how best to dispose of the asset, at which time the Government could become interested.
As long as the property is activate and functioning it should not matter who are the operators as it would be another attraction available to the tourism sector. In any event, a purchase of this nature should have been done with the full knowledge and consent of the prime minister, and possibly the Cabinet. It demonstrates a serious state of disconnect for a purchase outside of the core business of the NHT to come to the knowledge of the Prime Minister, and possibly the Government, in the way it did.
The property is now owned ostensibly by the NHT and with the level of dissenting voices and concerns about the purchase the Government should seek to bring an amicable settlement to the matter.
The property could be placed on the market with a reasonable period allowed for interested purchaser to make offers. If no reasonable offers are forthcoming in this period then a land swap could be arranged with the Government providing land to the value of the purchase price of the Outameni property to be exchanged with the NHT for the Outameni property.
This way the NHT would be provided with land that can be used to provide housing solutions for needy Jamaicans. The Outameni property could then be held by the commissioner of lands and managed, for example, by the Jamaica National Heritage Trust, which could then be leased to serious long-term business operators with the investment being recovered over a realistic timeframe.
Orlando Dyer
Kingston 6
Let's salvage the Outameni purchase
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