LA RIVIERA, La Fontaine, and La Renaissance are three high-rise towers in the West of Trinidad where some of the rich and famous reside. I can assure you that payment delinquency is not even a conversation and if it is, 40% delinquency is not the rate being discussed. It is likely to be less than 1%.
Why then is Minister of Housing and Urban Development Camille Robinson Regis crying about the 40% delinquency rate for state housing? Isn’t it the same society in which the behaviours are different? The difference in the individual responses lies in the systems, processes and procedures implemented in both circumstances. The residents of La Riviera, La Fontaine, and La Renaissance know that they would have to find alternative accommodation if they defaulted on payments.
On the other hand, beneficiaries of state accommodation believe that they have bartered their rental payment in exchange for their vote so they can do whatever they want. A close look at polling division voting results will support this statement. They are also very aware that they will not be evicted for nonpayment of rent.
Speaking at a function on July 20, Robinson-Regis showed an example of how bartering occurs when she said: “Homeowners believe as it’s the government, they do not have to pay” and provided this example in support of her conclusion, “people in my own constituency, whose rental is between $100 to $250, and yet they owing $50,000, which means from the day they got the unit, they have not paid.” If the minister knows this, then what has she done to correct this exploitation of the state and therefore the taxpayer by her constituents.
The concept of vote bartering continued when the minister talked about wanting homeowners to feel the commitment to pay and announced that the government will embark on a public education programme and use the strategies used by the former housing minister Randall Mitchell, where “customers felt the ease to pay up their arrears and not left to feel hounded.”
Had those soft strategies been successful, the minister would not be revealing this current 40% delinquency today, so what is her point?
With local government elections on the near horizon, my interpretation is that this is just another way to send a message to those 40% delinquents that the status quo has their backs and will be gentle on any hounding for legitimate payments. Once again we are reinforcing a culture of delinquency.
The minister is also making a soft call to the contractors by suggesting that if only they collected the approximately one billion dollars in arrears, they would be able to pay them the more than one billion they own.
Accounting is not as simple as this Madam Minister so please try another explanation of the government’s failure to honour its commitment to the contractors.
The real issue here is your government’s failure to put in place systems, processes, and procedures that would encourage a cultural shift and force occupants to pay their rent. If there are no consequences, then why should they make any payments?
For the umpteenth time, citizens are hearing that there is a new application system but for the word “revolutionized” to be associated with it is to insult our intelligence because digital application systems are the norm globally.
Despite this backwardness, it is however encouraging that a digital system was launched. This iteration of the PNM government has simply dropped the ball on managing and leading this country.
Seven years into your term in office, you should be ashamed to be promising many ICT solutions. We should be living those solutions. Your colleagues at the Ministry of Legal Affairs are still emailing citizens telling us to visit their offices to pay the $40 for annual returns.
By not putting the proper systems, processes, and procedures in place, you are supporting the culture which accepts nonpayment of rent as a norm.
My question is: Are citizens voting for you because you know how to manage the country’s business or are they voting for you because you let all of us get away with slackness? I want to vote for people who can manage the resources of the country in the best interest of the collective.
Dennise Demming is passionate about changing her country and finds inspiration interacting with creative, restless persons. As a mental health counsellor and communications practitioner, she is committed to making a difference wherever she lands. She believes that effective communication is the vehicle to release our creative energies for our mutual benefit. She earned a Masters Degree in Couples and Family Counselling from Walden University, an MBA, and a B.Sc. in Political Science & Public Administration from The University of the West Indies, St Augustine.
“I want to vote for people who can manage the resources of the country in the best interest of the collective”
I agree with you completed Ms Demming. This problem transcends parties.