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| TARPAULIN WRAP HOUSES |
Since the PM
declared that he is about to build 3700 houses, pictures of the banana
shed/copra houses that are being built by the government have surfaced and now
people have moved from doubtfulness to optimism. The Prime Minister just needed
to explain that the 3700 houses would be 8 x8 villas similar to the ones being
built in Grandbay with copra house type architecture- In stark contrast to the
Renneth Style Architecture that we see at the Savanne Paille villas.
MiTC has also
been monitoring some houses that are being built by government handlers with
the assistance of the Samaritan Purse. The Samaritan purse is an international
evangelical Christian disaster relief organization. The volunteers from the
Samaritan Purse are supposedly helping with the construction of houses
particularly in the North of the island however the government and its
handpicked DLP operatives are leading the operation with the distribution and
coordination of the resources (material and Labor) and as expected the DLP gang
decides who gets the assistance.
As always anything handled by Skerrit and his goons is based on electioneering tactics and as such things always turn out to be upside down, inside out and back to front. People are now asking why the government is building so many “Tarpaulin Homes”. The name Tarpaulin Homes comes from the fact that the government and its operatives are rushing to set up building frames and then the people are given tarpaulins to wrap around the building frames. The buildings are left unfinished and the often jobless occupants are left to figure out how they are going to provide a somewhat resilient or safe enclosure to their Tarpaulin Houses.
In keeping with
the Skerrit motive of keeping the people bamboozled and happy with less than
mediocrity, the idea of building so many unfinished Tarpaulin Wrapped Houses helps
create the false perception that the Skerrit government cares but as we all
know it, Mr. Skerrit and his bushwhackers only care about greed, power and the
art of keeping the people dependent and rashly loyal to Skerrit.
The rush to
erect so many “Tarpaulin Homes” has also resulted in the unfair distribution of
these half-finished houses. Friends and supporters of the Dominica Labor Party
are receiving multiple unfinished units and in some instances are using the
unfinished units to set up rum shops. There are cases where Laborites who either did not own a house
before Maria or did not have structural damages to their houses are desperately
finding plots just to have the Tarpaulin Home foundation built. While this is
happening people who are truly in need of building material are not receiving
the material from the government. The perpetuation of the “Some Eating All “ behavior e that has been nurtured and promoted by
the Roosevelt Skerrit regime.
We were also
disturbed by the fact that the entire Tarpaulin Home building process is
conducted in a desultory manner and seemingly without proper intervention by
the Physical Planning Department. It appears that the “Tarpaulin Homes” are
being configured on a “one size fit all “basis. A family of 6 or 8 gets the
same size structure as a single or two person family. We also notice that the red
toilet initiative is no longer important as these Tarpaulin Homes are erected
without sanitary facilities. What we may be witnessing here is the making of another
“City Soleile “as seen in Haiti.
While many are
wondering whether it is possible to erect 3700 houses particularly before the
election, people have been receiving standard partially completed building frames with roofs and tarpaulin wrap
façades. In fact a section of the Village of Bense is now named “ Samaritan
Purse” because of the number of unfinished “Tarpaulin Homes” that have been
erected by the Skerrit regime.
Who knows what the PM was thinking when he promised 3700 houses? Maybe an island with 3700 constructed Tarpaulin type houses or Samaritan Purse type communities could indeed become the first ever resilient country
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