CODY

Watching this video of a school being demolished in Hopley broke something in me. When we are fighting to protect young people from falling into drugs we are out here demolishing schools. The real scandal here is the system that created this situation. Ordinary people did not wake up and steal land but were sold stands, given papers, assured by people in authority that they were safe. We saw the same situation in St Martins when a Council owned and run Pay-Scheme was disowned in the heat of political pressure. How can the same system that looked away, or profited, or connived with land barons come back to punish them for trusting it? Land barons do not operate in a vacuum but thrive where Council is weak, compromised, or complicit. Council officials who should protect public land have instead been enabling its illegal sale. So to be clear accountability must start at the top, not at the bottom. Council authorities who connived with land barons, who issued or tolerated fake papers should be held accountable. Victims should not be made culpable for a failure of governance. Why have we not seen any Council official being held responsible @mafume We must prosecute the land barons and corrupt Council officials and have commissions that have tangible results.