Former PM Dean Barrow weighs in on Government’s $6.9M Land Deal in Belmopan

Former Prime Minister Dean Barrow has weighed in on the land acquisition in Belmopan for the construction of a new hospital.  It is a 6.9 million dollar investment approved by the government.  But was there other avenues that the government could and should have taken to acquire the land?  Barrow spoke with News Five yesterday, noting that there is something called compulsory acquisition for public purpose.

Rt. Hon. Dean Barrow, Former Prime Minister: “There’s no doubt that in my mind that that’s a legitimate public purpose. When government decides to acquire compulsorily for a public purpose, one of the things that the landowner can always question by going to court is whether the stated public purpose or the public purpose stated by government is indeed legitimately a public purpose. In this case, if you’re talking about acquiring land for a public hospital it seems to me that there is hardly any doubt that that constitutes a legitimate public purpose. The law actually says that when the minister declares something to be for a public purpose, that is his declaration alone is prima facie evidence that it is for a public purpose, but prima facie means it is rebuttable. There’s a presumption that it is for a public purpose, which the landowner can rebut. But in a situation where you’re talking about a public hospital, it is hard to see how any successful argument can be made that that is not a legitimate public purpose. It’s relatively straightforward. There is a Compulsory Acquisition Public Purposes Act, which has been used time out of hand for exactly the purposes for which the law is designed. So once there is a legitimate public purpose involved the government has nothing to worry about in terms of acquiring private property. It is absolutely provided for under the law and this is not anything peculiar to Belize. Any civilized, democratic progressive, society does afford that sort of right to a particular government. The public interest, the larger good must be allowed to override the personal interests of individual citizens so long as the individual citizen is going to be properly compensated for the dispossession of his or her property.”