Govt to demolish hundreds of homes in Vreed-en-Hoop: persons have nowhere to go

By Nicole Telford- Hundreds of residents from Jetty, an over 50-year-old community in Vreed-En-Hoop Best Foreshore on the West Bank of Demerara, houses are slated for demolition by the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C) Government. The PPP/C government deals to facilitate Exxon Mobil investments are targeting the social fabric of Guyanese whose blood, sweat, happiness and livelihood were made in that community, residents said.

Residents in the community spoke with Sherrod Duncan, host of the online ‘Credible Source,’ lamenting the years they lived in that community and highlighted many are now over sixty years old, not having the energy, strength or capital to rebuild their lives and livelihood elsewhere. According to the resident, over two hundred homes and some 900 children will be affected by the government’s decision

One resident said he was told by a Ministry of Housing employee who came to mark the homes that “Exxon Mobil tek over that area and shore base will be needing this entire area” the resident queried “them sell we out to the white people?”

Another resident read the letter they received from the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA), with a few lines asking them to come in and being given three-months to move. Another resident said when the CH&PA personnel visited they were very rude and disrespectful. “When he came he started marking these houses. ‘You have to move, you have to move, because we have to get this place in the next three months because GPL running some line,’ but we have the highest voltage and nobody never get shocked” the resident explained her vexation.

“President Ali came in here and said ‘wow, I didn’t know all this in here, I will make this place a city but pull in your fence because we are going to make a road here,’” the resident  also highlighted.

Recounting what the area was like before they moved in, one resident said the place was all mud and making the place livable came at great sacrifice and struggle. She noted people would fall in the mud and would get up, “the mud deh, we are wiping it and getting up to drag the materials.” She noted that promises were made to regularise the community by President Irfaan Ali when he was the Minister of Housing, which were never delivered. The resident said the community feels betrayed.

Another said “ah wander weh deh gun put we if we nah gat nunway fuh guh  we can’t move because  abwe nah get nun place fuh live adwe live hey for 15 years we need house and land because abwe gat lil chirren aback hey fuh guh a school, everybody aback here poor, dem come and tek lot number suh dem see how abwe poor, if dem give abwe house and land we gun move but them ah bulldoze where abwe gun guh, pun de street” abwe gun gaffa go pun government street and black de road because abwe nah have nun place fuh live.

Other residents of the Jetty community said they spent millions over the 50, 30, 20 and 15 years they have occupied and built their houses in the mud and marsh in the area. Consequently, they are calling on the government to provide them with house and land in areas with schools to facilitate their children’s school attendance.

A bewildered resident pointed out “meh husband old and weak and a wuk for $25,000.00 and me gat one daughter she ah nine year, when me guh supermarket de thing them suh expensive yuh gaha cook lil bit libit when de day up, suh yuh nah ah afford it suh. If dem want move we give we a house and land and we guh pay wan $8000.00 ah week and lil bit lil bit me nah mindful but them gaffa give me wan house and land”

Another said “I am 28 years old. I born and grow at the back here me mudda deh pregnant when she come at the back here to live in mud. They should have taken the land since then not now when we get what we worked for we don’t have theif man at the back here we happy here”

Persons recalled when the A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) came to office (2015-2020) “they came to the community and they built roads and give us lights to start the regularisation process.” They have expressed concern for their future because “now we don’t know where we will go.”

In recent months, the PPP/C government has taken a position of bulldozing homes in communities across the country, claiming the need for land space to promote development. Many residents of communities in Amelias’s Ward Linden, Hillfoot Linden Soesdyke Highway, Cane View Mocha Arcadia, and other prime locations in communities across Guyana are being railroaded with less than three months’ notice from the government. Residents are not given time for any court appearance or access to prescriptive rights allowed for by the laws of Guyana.