Mother fighting cancer given new home

"Best blessing ever," said Tower Hill, St Andrew resident Sidoney Eldemire, minutes after she was given the keys to her brand new two-bedroom house by Prime Minister Andrew Holness yesterday.

The unit was built under the New Social Housing Programme (NSHP). The dwelling is a massive upgrade to the broken-down board dwelling that she shared with her 14-year-old son. In addition to living in squalor, Eldemire, 37, said she has been fighting cervical cancer.

"When rain fall, I had to spread tarpaulin on it (the house) because it would be very wet inside. Chi chi (termites) and rainwater just tear it down after a while. Then three years ago, I found out that I was fighting stage 2 cancer, so it really did take a toll on me. But thank God I had my son with me. Right now I just ask God to uplift him and push him so he can do more to help somebody else like how somebody help us," she said. Eldemire, who worked as a babysitter prior to her cancer diagnosis, said she is hoping to start a small business as her illness has made it difficult to work for others.

The NSHP, which operates under the Housing, Opportunity, Production and Employment Programme, through the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation, is geared at improving the housing conditions of the country's most needy population. All 63 members of parliament are allowed to submit the names of five persons in their respective constituencies for support under the programme, which translates to approximately 315 housing units per annum.

Following a rigorous verification process, Eldemire's house was constructed in 28 days. Holness, while speaking at the handover ceremony, said this is very important as when less time is taken to build the houses, it means that prices will be lower and more persons will benefit from the programme.

He stated that an estimated 6,000 households in Jamaica would qualify for this type of social intervention.

"Can you imagine if the government was able to improve the living condition of 6,000 persons like Sidoney, how the quality of life in the country would improve? You would be taking the very poor, the worst off, and immediately lifting them up. It would immediately lift everyone in the society. That is the objective," he said.

Earlier this year, the prime minister appealed for entities to come on board and assist the government with the NSHP. So far, ARC Properties Limited has responded, and was instrumental in the construction of Eldemire's house. He explained that the entire process was tedious.

"From the time we have made the appeal to now, it has gone through an incredibly long process. We had to go through procurement, then we had to settle on design, and then it had to be constructed. But thankfully, the construction period was the shortest of everything that has to be done," Holness said.

The prime minister said the NSHP will break generational poverty and used Eldemire's situation as an example.

"There was no legacy passed on to Sidoney's father, there was no house or title passed on to him. Then he had Sidoney and then Sidoney had her son. What is she going to pass on to her son? It is poverty being handed down from generation to generation. Poverty basically has three dimensions to it. The first dimension is whether or not you have an asset, the second is whether or not you have income, and the third dimension is whether you have access to amenities and social services," he said.