As questions continue over President Irfaan Ali’s Long Creek farm and amid growing calls for greater transparency, Kiskadee Watch has been unable to obtain responses from key state agencies with responsibility for the administration of state lands and environmental oversight.
Yesterday, Kiskadee Watch visited the Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission (GLSC) headquarters on Hadfield Street seeking comment from Chief Executive Officer Enrique Monize on matters relating to the leasing of lands for the President’s agricultural operations.
However, Monize was unavailable.
His secretary informed this newspaper that he was in a meeting and indicated that two senior officers dealt directly with such matters.
One of those officers, Senior Land Administration Officer for Region Four Cycrene Fredericks, declined to comment. According to staff, Fredericks said she would not speak to anyone and had left the building for lunch.
Land Administration Manager Jewel Cheong also declined to comment, saying she was not authorised to speak with the media under any circumstances and that Monize normally addresses such issues.
Kiskadee Watch also visited the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) at Sophia in an effort to speak with Executive Director Kemraj Parsram.
Parsram was unavailable and, through his secretary, requested that questions be submitted in writing.
The newspaper has previously made several attempts to obtain comment from the EPA by telephone but the calls were not returned despite assurances that responses would be provided.
The inability to secure answers from either agency comes as scrutiny of the President’s Long Creek farm continues to intensify, with politicians, governance advocates and former public officials calling for greater disclosure regarding the acquisition of the land, the financing of the development and the role of oversight agencies.
The latest call came from opposition Member of Parliament Terrence Campbell, who has tabled a private member’s bill seeking to amend the Integrity Commission Act to require the publication of summary declarations filed by holders of specified public offices.
Campbell argues that the controversy surrounding the President’s farm has exposed weaknesses in Guyana’s transparency framework.
“This country cannot depend on fallouts between friends before allegations of unusual accumulation of wealth by public officials are raised in the public domain,” Campbell said in a video statement. “We need systems and laws that will allow anyone, be it somebody from civil society, be it a journalist, to have access to information that will then be investigated.”
His proposed legislation would require the Integrity Commission to publish summaries of asset declarations submitted by senior public officials, including the President, ministers, permanent secretaries, heads of state agencies, commissioners of constitutional bodies and regional executive officers.
Campbell said he accelerated work on the bill following public questions surrounding the President’s farm and challenged parliamentary leaders to voluntarily release their 2025 Integrity Commission declarations.
“I, Terrence Campbell, stand ready to release my entire declaration come Monday morning once such an agreement can be forged,” he said.
The controversy began after Opposition Leader Azruddin Mohamed released a video in which he questioned the scale and financing of the President’s agricultural operations. Standing near the property, Mohamed estimated that the ranch, which he described as encompassing about 150 acres, represented an investment exceeding $2.2 billion. He contended that such a development—including poultry tunnel houses, cattle and sheep facilities, electrical infrastructure, heavy equipment and an access road—could not have been financed from the President’s declared salary.
President Ali subsequently rejected Mohamed’s estimates of both the size and value of the farm and said the project had been financed through a “huge loan” from the banking system.
“My farm is not a discovery. It is public information… a farm that I have built and can account for every single investment in that farm,” the President said, adding that the property had been declared to the Integrity Commission.
However, he did not publicly release documents showing when the land was acquired, the total amount invested or the financing arrangements.
Former Auditor General Anand Goolsarran has since argued that the President should publicly answer key questions, including who approved the leasing of additional lands, the total value of the investment and the sources of financing.
Tracing the history of the property, Goolsarran noted that two leases totalling about 20 acres were approved for Ali in September 2011 by then President Bharrat Jagdeo shortly before he demitted office. He questioned how the acreage subsequently expanded, saying it would be inappropriate for a President to approve additional leases to himself.
Goolsarran also renewed calls for the Integrity Commission to go beyond merely collecting declarations.
“It must scrutinise such declarations for completeness and accuracy and for any mismatch with the observable lifestyles of the officials involved,” he said.
He further questioned whether the Commission has been fulfilling its statutory obligation to submit annual reports to the National Assembly.
Former EPA Executive Director Vincent Adams has also argued that any significant expansion of the livestock operation should have required fresh environmental approvals, while Transparency Institute Guyana Inc (TIGI), the Guyana Trades Union Congress (GTUC), the Alliance For Change (AFC), We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) and former Minister of Public Infrastructure David Patterson have all called for greater disclosure or independent investigations into the development.
Chartered accountant and attorney Christopher Ram has similarly argued that documentary evidence—not official assurances—will determine the matter.
“The documents will tell the real story,” Ram wrote in a recent commentary, posing a series of questions about the financing, ownership and acquisition of the farm.
He argued that the issue extends beyond agriculture and has become a broader test of governance in an oil-producing state.
“Oil has raised the value of public office. It has also raised the price of weak governance,” Ram said, adding that independent institutions—not presidential explanations—must ultimately determine whether public confidence is warranted.
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