Newtown Ground New Homes
Basseterre, St. Kitts – Nevis
September 12, 2013 (CUOPM)
St. Kitts and Nevis‘ Prime Minister the Right Hon. Dr. Denzil L. Douglas has announced the continuation of his ruling St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party’s Housing Development Programme.
He told a large crowd at a Central Street Rally that having met with the CEO of the National Housing Corporation (NHC), the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Housing, the Hon. Dr. Earl Asim Martin will soon officially announce the construction of an additional 500 homes.
“We started the Housing Solutions (HS) 500 homes but at that time the target was really 1,000 homes for our people with 500 being only half of the target,” said Prime Minister Douglas, who disclosed that he indicated during the discussions that the policy of the government is to ensure that the first 500 homes and the additional 500 homes must be built for the benefit of the people.
“A number of people have not yet received homes, those single men in particular. The men are saying “˜Prime Minister you guys are only concentrating on the women, but what about us.’ We have now devised a plan that our single men they must improve their living standards and they too need to stop living in rented houses especially in premises where they don’t even have modern facilities,” said Prime Minister Douglas.
Dubbing it the Independence 30 Housing Development programme, Dr. Douglas noted that there are still some women who are still living in very poor and deplorable conditions.
“On the 30th Anniversary of our Independence it will be for all of our people. Some of you will be vex when you see a PAM person in a house, but don’t get vex. I want to say to you that we shall improve the housing stock here in St. Kitts and Nevis for the benefit of all of our people,” said the Prime Minister.
He pointed out that since taking office his government has also provided assistance to middle income persons to own their own homes.
“We have had programmes for the low middle income earners. The public servants were given special assistance in order to obtain the necessary support by government, using the value of their pensions that would have accrued as the collateral, as they borrowed from the St. Kitts and Nevis Development Bank in order to get their own homes,” said the Prime Minister.