A woman from Armenia Village today went to the Supreme Court asking for protection from the Ministry of Natural Resources because in June of 2008 it cancelled the lease for the property she has called home for 12 years. And worse than that, Edna Sama-Yoa claims that she’s being politically victimized because her neighbour who’s now the new leaseholder is a supporter of the Area Representative, Ramon Witz. That neighbour is also her ex-sister in law, which only complicates matters.
Today the single mother of three had her day in court where the first hearing for her application for judicial review was held. Dean Lindo appeared for Area Rep. Ramon Witz, and asked for his client to be removed from the claim because only the Minister can cancel or grant leases. Justice Michelle Arana agreed and the case will now only proceed with the Ministry of Natural Resources as the respondent. Douglas Carr represents Natural Resources and told us why he is confident that the Ministry did nothing wrong.
Douglas Carr, Attorney – MNRI
“There are certain provisions in the National Lands Act which the Minister of Natural Resources is obliged to follow in cancelling any lease. Notice is given, opportunity to remedy breach, and so forth and if that opportunity is not acted upon and the breach is not remedied then the Minister can exercise his discretion to cancel the lease. There is nothing political in that. Cancellations happen everyday and we are of the view that the Minister of Natural Resources
acted within the law when he acted and cancelled Mr. Sama-Yoa’s lease.”
Jules Vasquez,
In what way did she fail to meet the terms of her lease that made her eligible for cancellation?
Douglas Carr,
“Well as we are presenting on the side of the first defendant, we are saying that there was not development, she failed to develop the property as required under the lease agreement and as such she was served a notice of cancellation of the Minister’s intention to cancel and in that notice there was a provision where she could have made representation or she can do certain things to remedy the breach and she simply failed to do that.”
Andrea McSweaney-McKoy, Attorney for Edna Sama-Yoa
“Indisputably the Minister does have power to cancel of lease but the giving of notice is for us an issue of fact. Do you give notice when you produce a letter and not dispatch it? What happened in this case is that the letter was never dispatched to our client and on a subsequent trip to the Ministry of Natural Resources, at which time our client intended to purchase the property or apply to purchase the property, that is when she was served with the letter and told oh no, we cannot accept your application to purchase, your lease has been cancelled.”
Jules Vasquez,
Do you think your client is the victim of an unjust politically motivated decision?
Andrea McSweaney-McKoy,
“To an extent but I would rather to
frame the case around our client’s lease being unlawfully terminated and on our client being very desirous and very needy of that property. That is the only property she calls home, she knows as home. She has lived there for over thirteen years and we do think the result is unjust but we will restrict our comments to the least being unlawfully cancelled.”
Jules Vasquez,
Would your client be satisfied with an alternate piece of land, an alternate property?
Andrea McSweaney-McKoy,
“No, she has asked just for this piece.”
Jules Vasquez,
Reason being?
Andrea McSweaney-McKoy,
“This is her home.”
The hearing will proceed on May 26th. In the meantime, Edna Sama-Yoa and her children have moved into her mother’s home across the road – even while her possessions remain in her home. That’s because the new lease-holder has started building around Sama-Yoa’s home.
