JAMAICA: Squatter Resettlement Programme in Trouble

By Zadie Neufville Reprint | | Print |

Zadie Neufville

KINSGTON, Feb 21 2002 (IPS) - Four years ago, Idalee Watson made the first deposit on what was to be her dream home: a modest one- bedroom house with room for expansion.

She confides that several previous attempts at ownership over the years failed because she did not earn enough to qualify for a mortgage and, according to the single mother of three, government housing projects offered a sense of security.

Then came Operation Pride and for the first time, the 53-year-old street vendor says, her own home seemed well within reach.

“I couldn’t afford it but God helped me and I borrowed that first 3,000 dollars (65 U.S. dollars) to make the payment,” she says.

She started to make small weekly payments, obtained a mortgage from the National Housing Development Corporation (NHDC), and began to save up to add a second bedroom.

Only now, she fears her dream might never become reality. Citing massive cost overruns, exorbitant consultancy fees, and allegations of political interference at the NHDC, Prime Minister P.J. Patterson has ordered an investigation into the project, aimed at providing affordable housing for thousands of the poorest Jamaicans.

Operation Pride was set up to upgrade 110 housing sites, including 50 squatter settlements, and provide some 20,000 housing units to those who could not acquire homes by the normal means.

With roughly one-fourth of the Jamaican population – about 600,000 – living in an estimated 1,000 squatter settlements and on marginal lands across the island, the initiative was to have been the answer to the Jamaica’s squatter problem. It was first announced in 1994.

Close to 100 million dollars reportedly was spent on 20 projects but an NHDC audit has found that much of the work is still far from complete and that half the projects are expected to overrun their original cost by more than 117 million dollars.

Saying that more than 21 million dollars have already been paid for work that had not been done, opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) spokesman Audley Shaw is urging the auditor-general, chief public prosecutor, and fraud squad to investigate Operation Pride.

Water and Housing Minister Carl Blythe and NHDC chairman Michael Vaccianna both say the audit report is incomplete and false. Faced with allegations of corruption from the JLP, however, Patterson has appointed a four-member commission to conduct the probe, ignoring an investigation already ordered by Blythe.

Last week, NHDC chief Christopher Honeywell resigned suddenly and left the island, fueling speculation of political interference and cover-ups. He reportedly left after Blythe reinstated four employees sacked for authorising millions of dollars in payments for work that apparently was never done.

According to Patterson, the commission has six weeks to report back on what has gone wrong and how to improve accountability and integrity. JLP leader Edward Seaga has urged that Operation Pride be halted and Blythe be fired.

However, the project is too important to the People’s National Party (PNP) administration and the thousands like Idalee who are waiting to receive their houses and lots. It is central to the governing party’s commitment to provide all squatters and informal settlers with certificates of tenure for their homes.

Pride was designed to eliminate political influence from self-help housing projects but has been criticised as a tool of the ruling PNP. Dave Allen, who represents several Kingston-based Provident Societies, strongly denies political involvement among member organisations.

Like Idalee, however, he says he fears the project is destined to become a political football in the run up to general elections due in December. “All the good projects get dragged into party manipulation and while they (the parties) fight, the needs of the people are not met,” says Allen.

The latest controversy adds to delays suffered in Pride’s early years because of strong middle-class resistance to low-income settlements, which better-off neighbours perceived as a threat to their property values.

Clifton Yapp, head of the Jamaica Institute of Architects, confirms that members of his organisation are guilty of overcharging for services provided to the Pride project. While declining to name any government officials who might be involved, Yap says it has become normal for “extra money to be built into contracts for pay-offs”.

Bruce Golding, a former housing minister, says no limit has been imposed on the amount of money to be spent on each job or on each project within the initiative.

Coy Grandison, a government expert on the squatter problem, explains that costs vary according to the amount of infrastructure provided at each housing site. Under Operation Pride, prospective homeowners decide the level of infrastructure they want and the amount they can afford to pay for their homes, and save towards this, depositing their money in Provident Societies, to which they belong. The NHDC uses this money to build homes or provide serviced lots – those with roads, sewage, electricity, and telephone infrastructure.

Allen says a lack of expertise has left these groups vulnerable to greedy lawyers, architects, and contractors. “We need help to train and strengthen the management capacity of the Provident Societies,” he says, adding that the failure of the middle classes to assist with the project has allowed technocrats to overcharge for the services they provide.

As far back as 1997, Auditor-General Adrian Strachan saw signs of what was to come when he pointed to several instances in which payments for work done “far exceeded the value of the agreements seen”.

So, the NHDC’s expertise was sought in determining site suitability and building costs. And last year, the Provident Societies were stripped of their responsibility to choose contractors after JLP leaders claimed that only PNP supporters were being awarded Operation Pride contracts.

A non-partisan committee now allocates all contracts. Many Provident Societies, however, have voiced concern at being denied the right to choose their own builders.

Contractors say they will double efforts to complete the projects they have already started. Meanwhile, Allen says he wants assurances from the political parties that the programme will not be derailed

As for Idalee, she says she wants only one thing: “my own little one-bedroom house to rest my head”.