Politicians have duped squatters for decades, PM says

PRIME MINISTER Andrew Holness lashed out on Thursday against the scourge of squatting, declaring it a breeder of chaos in the country.

Holness said the practice could be traced back to the days of slavery but contended that Jamaica could no longer allow trespassers to arbitrarily claim lands.

“Governments must support this ambitious drive of Jamaicans to own Jamaica. But ownership cannot happen in chaos,” Holness said at the handover ceremony of letters of possession to new lot owners of the Windcrest Hills community in Hellshire, St Catherine, on Thursday.

The prime minister said that orderly landownership was critical to protecting citizen rights.

Holness made it clear that under his leadership, there will be no land free-for-all.

“This Government that I currently lead cannot continue this destructive history that we have had of tacitly allowing people to settle on land improperly,” Holness asserted.

Seemingly acknowledging the role politicians have played in the mushrooming of informal communities, the prime minister said that squatters have been lied to. He said they had been offered empty promises of better infrastructure like roads, schools, electricity, and garbage collection.

‘Fifty years and more have gone and none of those have come,” the prime minister admitted.

“They may own the rock, but they have no value. They can’t sell it, they can’t legitimately pass it on to their children, they can’t borrow against it.”

UNESCO estimates that 25 per cent of Jamaica’s 2.8 million population is squatting, but assessments have put that projection as high as a third.

Holness said his administration is providing the means by which land can be settled and traded legitimately.

The issuance of titles, he said, was fundamental to economic and social empowerment.

One of the new lot owners, Lorna Graham Sterling, who is in her 50s, had been applying since she was around 30 years old. She told The Gleaner that she could hardly find words to express her joy at finally being selected to benefit from National Housing Trust support.

“Over the years, I have been applying, applying, and not being successful. So now that I have and now own piece of land, I’m ecstatic!” she said.

IAN ALLEN/PHOTOGRAPHER James Sterling and wife Lorna Graham-Sterling could not hide the joy they felt after they were presented with the title to a lot in Windcrest Hills in Hellshire, Portmore, St Catherine, on Thursday. The Sterlings were among 70 others whose titles to service lots were handed over to them by the National Housing Trust.