The Minister of Land Use & Housing, Christian Lionnet has appointed the Members of the Town & Country Planning Authority, in accordance with the the terms of reference provided by Town & Country Planning Act.

The appointments are effective today for a period of two years.

The Members of the Board are as follows:

Mr Hughes Adam        Chairperson

Mr Wilson Nancy        Member

Mr Sunil Shah              Member

Mr Cyril Bonnelame   Member

Mr Flavien Joubert      Member

Dr Jude Gédéon         Member

Mr Patrick André        Member

Ms Sinha Levkovic       Member

Mr Gabriel Essack       Member

Mr Patrick Lablache   Member

Mr Barry Assary          Member

Mr Ron Felix              Member

The board has stronger representation of the private sector, where 5 members inclusive of the chairman are from the private sector.

The new board of the Planning Authority is mandated to improve the efficiency and speed of its work, in order to deliver a better service to citizens and businesses in Seychelles.

This follows the call by President James Michel during his State of the Nation Address for the need to improve the ease of doing business in Seychelles.

“We shall continue to encourage all Seychellois to be enterprising.  Encourage everyone to work hard.  We must create a better environment for doing business in our country.  Create more employment.  Increase productivity.  Let us work together to remove obstacles that hinder our people.  Many people complain that their principal sources of frustration are the Licensing Authority, the Planning Authority, or the Customs.  We really must get ourselves in order! ”said President Michel in the address.

The President said that while Seychelles ranks 85th out of 189 countries where it concerns ease of doing business, the Government strategy is to improve this rank and place Seychelles among the 30 best countries for doing business in the next 5 years.