But that still leaves an important question - where was the breakdown in communication that caused Choc to prepare for a ceremony that never happened?
Well, according to MIDH's Public Relations Manager, Marisa Alamilla - who has been personally involved in every single handing over - she informed Usher's point person - his niece - on December 14th that the ceremony would be postponed - and she's got the screenshots to prove it.
Whether that message was relayed to Usher... Well, we're not sure.
But why was the handing over postponed in the first place? Alamilla explained that the house wasn't up to standard, and she refused to give Choc something that would have to be repaired or renovated.
And she also added that the reason the house wasn't ready for today is because the contractor was too busy painting Usher's house for Christmas!
Here's what she told us today:
Marisa Alamilla, Public Relations Manager, MIDH
"When I did the final inspection, I could not pass the house for handover, I informed the contractor that he needed to come back, our lead inspector, Mr Noel Harvey, informed the contractor of all the things that we needed to meet standard and the contractor informed us that he was painting Honorable Usher's house for the Christmas and so he could not possibly leave that to come and finish our house so since that is the situation and since the contractor apparently is friends with the minister, we don't get involved in that, we have to wait."
"It's just small remedial touches that we have come to take pride in, if the paint is not done properly, if the- any little thing that we see that is not up to standard, those are the little things, it's not a lot of work, if his contractor would have left the Christmas painting, we could have handed over his house. And I told him that, I said your contractor has said he's painting your house so can we.. I was thinking he would have called his contractor and said, leave my house and come finish this lady house, but he didn't do that, I can't tell the man stop."
"Honestly, my issue is more based on the fact that we must understand who are building for. We are building for persons who have limited means. They cannot get into a house and then have to fix anything. Our Minister is cognizant of that and so our minister imparts on us that we must deliver a certain quality so that we don't give these people more stress. The idea is to relieve stress, not to give them stress, and I thought that if anybody would understand that, Honorable Usher who leads a constituency of these very people would understand why we need to meet a certain quality, why we need to- I would have more been more than happy to hand over Ms Apolinaria's house this morning, but we cannot, she will be the same one to be dissatisfied with that."
But what about Usher's claims that Port Loyola has been overlooked by the ministry? Alamilla called that accusation a lie and explained why they haven't been able to build any other starter homes in the division yet.
Gilroy Usher, Area Rep, Port Loyola
"One of the excuse was that they said there was delay in people obtaining the title for their land so I said, that has been addressed, the people have the title for their land. There was once the excuse that they had to fill the land, the land has been filled. All those has been filled so what's the excuse going forward?"
"In terms of preparedness, our people have title for their land. Four of the lots have already been filled, the persons who should received the started homes are all employed, the residents of Port Loyola, are ready to experience the dream of better housing with the starter homes as the other residents in the other divisions."
Marisa Alamilla, Public Relations Manager, MIDH
"All the houses that have been approved for building and for construction for Minister Usher are in swamp and we have gone ahead and we have filled those properties with clay and we are waiting for the clay to consolidate, clay takes 6-9 months to consolidate, we have some of his homes earmarked for beginning of January to start because they have consolidated, we will put more loads of sand on them in the first week of January and then we will wait a couple weeks and then we can start those homes because we'll bind the clay to start. One of the land, basically, we need to put 20 more loads so we'll have to wait until that consolidates again so if I don't do that, the houses will sink, we will get a bad reputation, Mr Usher's going to get a bad reputation, and we can't afford that."
"Some of the houses, when they were approved, they were approved on leases, we have to ensure that the leases still belong to those people because as you well know, sometimes previous governments will cancel a lease and not inform the person so the person thinks he own the lease and he doesn't really so I have to go into Lands, do all of that paperwork before I can even start to fill. They are well aware of all these problems we have."
Courtney Menzies:
"Do you feel like because you're all part of one team, you're all part of one government, that he should have come to you or to Minister Espat before making those comments that he made?"
Marisa Alamilla, Public Relations Manager, MIDH
"Yes, I believe that, I believe that we have been more than open with Honorable Usher, we have tried to assist him in any way we can, we have gone above and beyond, my job is not to go to Lands to find out is a lease is still existing or not, they were having problems finding that out, I took it on my own, I went to try and make sure that happened so we could start putting the loads of materials so he could get what he wanted."
And Alamilla has promised that Choc will get her house as soon as possible.
But even after all of the kerfuffle, Minister Espat and Usher insist that there is no bad blood between them. But it's a battle that will have to take place behind the Cabinet doors.
