by Quinton Alomp – EM TV, Port Moresby
The National Housing Corporation (NHC) Managing Director, John Dege says he was poorly advised to effect the evicting of four tenants of a residential flat at Tokarara, in NCD late last month.
He claimed a few corrupt people working in NHC had collected some money (amount not given) to facilitate the eviction. They then misled him into signing the eviction notice, he said.
Mr Dege said while he was doing everything to weed out corruption in NHC which has been rampant over the years, it is still at work.
Late last month, Mr Dege instructed his officers with the aid of police to evict eight tenants of those flats at Tokarara. The instruments signed were for four tenants to be evicted.
However, eight were removed with all their belongings and slept outside for four nights. The four tenants owed NHC K30,000 in total.
After the old tenants were removed, the new tenants were called into NHC office, signed the Tenancy Agreement form and were issued keys to the flats. They went in immediately and occupied the flats, knowing that they were legal tenants.
However, on the fifty day, Mr Dege instructed the old tenants to move back into the flats. This has resulted in gun shots being fired and tensions mounting between the old and new tenants.
Today, Mr Dege issued a press statement saying he was poorly advised and sympathise with the original tenants.
“I sympathise with the tenants who were evicted and reinstated subsequently because there was an administrative oversight that led to the situation.
“On top of that, the new tenancy agreement for the new tenants were signed by unauthorised officers and never signed by me as the duly authorised signatory,” Managing Director Dege said.
He said he was misled into signing the eviction notice.
