PNM's PROPERTY TAX DANGEROUS: COUDRAY

Marlene Coudray

Local Government Minister Marlene Coudray told supporters on Friday poor people will lose their properties if the PNM gets into office and implements the Property Tax.

She was speaking at a joint cottage meeting hosted by the PP's San Fernando East and San Fernando West candidates Ashaki Scott and Raziah Ahmed held at Manjack Street, Marabella.
 
Coudray, who served as a San Fernando Mayor before she became a government minister, said thousands of people will not be able to afford to pay taxes for their properties if the PNM makes good on its promise to set up the Revenue Authority.
 
"I served as CEO of the San Fernando City Corporation and when the PNM proposed the property tax, I did a document and told them that those taxes will kill people and make them lose their properties as they will not be able to pay," Coudray said.

She added that the poor people on the Marabella Trainline were scheduled to pay $3,600 per year under the proposed property tax scheme. "We looked at the poor people in Pleasantville and they were down to pay $3,600. In Gulf View, people's properties would have gone up by 3,000 per cent. When you cannot pay taxes, the corporation will put properties up for sale," Coudray warned.

She also spoke about a prominent San Fernando family who has a descendant in PNM politics. This family, Coudray said, purchased multiple properties decades ago from poor people who could not pay property taxes.
 
"I want to ask who was taking people properties when they couldn’t pay their rates? The sharks are out there waiting to prey on innocent people again," Coudray added.
 
She said under the Kamla Persad-Bissessar administration, there will be no property tax for 2016.
 
"The Prime Minister has said that all squatters will be regularized and we have to let people settle themselves before we have taxes," Coudray explained. She also accused the Opposition Leader Dr Keith Rowley of trying to hoodwink the population by promising to reduce VAT to 12.5 per cent.
 

Ashaki Scott

Saying that the PP government had already reduced VAT on 7,000 food items, Coudray said that Rowley planned to put back VAT on the 7,000 food items before implementing the 12.5 per cent decrease.
 
Meanwhile, Scott urged the supporters to vote for Persad-Bissessar. Saying she came from a lineage of anti-PNM activists, Scott vowed to end infrastructural neglect in the south city. Ahmed also promised a clean city.

She said water will be made available for all, and health care and education will be world class.