The sud­den re­tire­ment of com­mis­sion­er of state lands Ian Fletch­er leaves the door wide open for the land grab­bing to con­tin­ue. Fletch­er re­tired last month and has not yet been re­placed.

Land and Ma­rine Re­sources Min­is­ter Jairam Seemu­n­gal con­firmed that there was no com­mis­sion­er of state lands in place. In a brief in­ter­view with the Sun­day Guardian yes­ter­day, Seemu­n­gal al­so con­firmed that it was on­ly the com­mis­sion­er of state lands of­fice that could en­force the State Land Act which pre­vent­ed the il­le­gal oc­cu­pan­cy of state lands.

In the ab­sence of a com­mis­sion­er of state lands how­ev­er, Seemu­n­gal is warn­ing would-be squat­ters that they are oc­cu­py­ing lands "at their own risk."

"Once a com­mis­sion­er of state lands is ap­point­ed, then the of­fice can lever­age on il­le­gal squat­ters," he said.

He said he ex­pect­ed to have that of­fice filled "hope­ful­ly this week."

Fletch­er's de­par­ture has left the En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA) in a quandary over the il­le­gal oc­cu­pa­tion of state lands.

The Sun­day Guardian has learned there are now se­ri­ous con­cerns that well-placed peo­ple are in­volved in il­le­gal, be­hind-the-scenes land grabs as on­ly a com­mis­sion­er of state lands of­fice can say which land be­longs to the State and which does not.

The emp­ty of­fice is al­ready cre­at­ing a prob­lem for the EMA as it at­tempt­ed to is­sue a stop no­tice on the con­trac­tors be­hind the mil­lion-dol­lar land works in Ota­heite but have been un­able to lo­cate any of the con­trac­tors be­hind the se­cret project.

Two weeks ago, the Sun­day Guardian re­port­ed il­le­gal back fill­ing from in­land to­wards the sea in Ota­heite and learned then that four se­cret con­trac­tors were re­spon­si­ble for the mul­ti-mil­lion-dol­lar land grab and land­fill op­er­a­tions on the wa­ter's edge in Ota­heite.

The works are con­tin­u­ing un­abat­ed and the land is still be­ing filled and has al­ready been turned in­to a long stretch of wa­ter­front prop­er­ty in the in­dus­tri­al space next to Damus Oil Ltd.

Out­go­ing EMA chair­man, Dr Al­lan Bachan, in an in­ter­view with the Sun­day Guardian on Thurs­day said he was sur­prised that no one, not even the work­ers on the job site knew who is be­hind the works. "Well, with no com­mis­sion­er of state lands in place, I hate to think what could hap­pen be­cause on­ly that of­fice can en­force the State Lands Act," Bachan said.

Seemu­n­gal and Fletch­er clashed months ago over an al­leged il­le­gal land oc­cu­pan­cy by Su­per In­dus­tri­al Ser­vices Ltd (SIS) in Cou­va.

While Fletch­er had claimed then that SIS did not have any rights to the 35-acres prop­er­ty, Seemu­n­gal con­tra­dict­ed him, say­ing that SIS was legal­ly oc­cu­py­ing the land but re­fused then to di­vulge any de­tails of the deal with SIS.