WHERE IS OUR MONEY??

THE FOLIE DE GRANDEUR OF THE SSF BUILDING

The Seychelles Pension Fund building at Le Chantier in Victoria is one white elephant that boggles the mind! It was conceived and trumpeted its way into reality with the sole purpose of siphoning off some dubious cash that the then king of the castle Francis Chang Leng had on hand. This cash is mostly taxpayers contributions to the SSF which ex governor ‘Sosis’ wanted to ‘invest’. What an investment! Probably the most ludicrous investment into concrete even made in Seychelles. The cash was mainly ‘disbursed’ to fill the bank account of architect brother of Sarah Rene as well as the ‘family’ owned Island Construction Company run for and on behalf of the crème de la crème of the SPPF / Parti Lepep. Many will recall that the financial ‘genius’ Danny Boy was also a shareholder of this construction company and had to resign.

The eyesore of a building is a total disgrace to the Victoria skyline. Taking more than three years to build, the monstrosity is now 90% unoccupied and falling to waste. This is all TAXPAYERS’ money that Chang Leng has wasted and poured down a black hole. Like his Lehman junk bonds fiasco, this venture has forever burned a hole in our pockets.

Where is our money Mr. Chang Leng? Can James Michel be accountable to this financial disaster please?

Here are the mind boggling facts of the SSF building.

1. It cost the Seychellois Pension Fund contributors (taxpayers) over Sr. 125 million. It is several stories of blemish designed with no aesthetics in mind (looks like a bunker!). It has an elevator which has never worked. No tenants apart from the ground floor and a few on the second floor.

2. There is no adequate parking space as per the building laws of Seychelles.

3. Designed by Kamal Zarquani (Albert Rene’s brother in law) and built by Island Construction (Albert Rene’s building company) without a proper tender.

4. Initial design was 4 stories and it ended up being 7 stories high again flouting the laws of Seychelles.

5. At today’s exchange rate the ‘building’ cost a whopping Scr. 195,312,000.00. With rents going for Scr. 5,000 this is barely Scr. 2,500 (based on devaluation). This is what you call a gigantic white elephant. There is not enough money to do basic maintenance on the structure and it is already falling apart.

6. Such waste would have paid for: 1000 houses or 100 clinics, or two brand new hospitals, or 30 police stations with 3 patrol cars each, or 10 new prisons, or 2 reservoirs, or 3 generators, or 12 schools or 4 universities, or 25 times complete resurfacing of all Mahe and Praslin roads etc... It could have purchased our fibre optic connections to the world, and today, we would not be lending money for it from International Financial Corporation (IFC). The connection would help all businesses in Seychelles create more wealth. This would mean more meaningful jobs beyond, just cleaning and cutting grass for Seychellois.

This monstrosity is akin to the inflated ego of the powers that be and the biggest rip off that the Seselwa have endured.

Until when are we going to continue taking all this lying down?