WILLEMSTAD – Fundashon E Hende (FEH) is asking Curaçao authorities to investigate an alleged plan involving the allocation of 500 government plots to a single interested party, but the documents submitted by the foundation do not yet establish that 500 individual leasehold rights were actually transferred to one developer.
The allegation forms part of three letters sent by FEH to several institutions concerning public housing and government land.
For the land issue, FEH wants Parliament to organize a public hearing, the Ombudsman to investigate whether principles of proper administration were followed, the General Audit Chamber to examine legality and efficiency, and the government to reconstruct how the relevant decisions were made.
FEH states that, “as far as we know,” a former VVRP minister issued 500 plots without a public announcement, tender procedure, published objective criteria or justification for a direct allocation. According to the foundation, a public-private partnership, or PPP, was used as justification.
However, the letter does not identify the former minister, the alleged beneficiary, the cadastral numbers of the 500 plots or the individual decisions through which they were supposedly issued.
Two 500-home agreements found
Publicly available information does confirm that the Curaçao government entered into two major PPP agreements in 2019, each involving the construction of 500 homes.
On May 14, 2019, then-VVRP Minister Zita Jesus-Leito signed an agreement with Eigen Woning Plan for the construction of 500 homes across six neighborhoods.
Later that year, Jesus-Leito also signed an agreement with Dusron Bouwbedrijf involving another 500 homes in Weto, Sapaté Noord, Rooi Santu and Kirindongo Abou.
The publicly documented structure of the latter project is important when assessing FEH's allegation.
Under that arrangement, the government would make land available, the private developer would prepare the sites and construct the houses, and the government would subsequently issue the individual plot in long lease to the customer.
That is legally different from granting 500 leasehold plots directly to one developer.
The available public information therefore confirms that private companies were selected for large government-backed housing projects involving hundreds of homes. It does not, however, prove FEH's specific allegation that 500 leasehold rights were awarded to a single party.
It is also unclear whether FEH's allegation concerns Eigen Woning Plan, Dusron or an entirely different project.
Ombudsman previously criticized land procedures
While the specific 500-plot allegation remains unproven based on the available documents, broader concerns about government land allocation have previously been raised by Curaçao's Ombudsman.
An Ombudsman investigation into complaints concerning the allocation of government land for housing concluded that objective, verifiable and reasonable criteria are necessary to ensure that citizens have equal opportunities to compete for scarce government land.
The Ombudsman also examined the relevance of the Dutch Didam judgment to Curaçao and concluded that the legal principles extend to rental and long-lease transactions.
The investigation contained significant criticism of VVRP's handling of complaints.
According to the report, the minister failed to answer the Ombudsman's questions despite three reminders. In nearly all cases that ultimately resulted in an investigative report, citizens' complaints were declared justified.
The Ombudsman's overall conclusion was that complaint handling surrounding government leasehold allocations between 2020 and 2024 generally failed to meet standards of proper administration.
The Dutch Supreme Court subsequently clarified in its second Didam ruling in 2024 that an agreement concluded in violation of the Didam rules is not automatically invalid. Government can nevertheless have acted unlawfully and potentially be liable for damages.
FEH's request could therefore open a broader discussion extending beyond whether 500 plots were actually allocated to one party. It could also examine how private developers were selected for large housing projects, what criteria were applied, how government land was ultimately distributed and whether residents were given equal and transparent opportunities.
For now, however, the central allegation remains to be substantiated. As the available material indicates, the underlying land decisions and other primary documents would have to be produced before it can be determined which of FEH's claims can be confirmed.