MONTEGO BAY, St James–Scores of squatters in Norwood Pen and Paradise Pen are fearful of being bulldozed out of their homes following last week’s serving of demolition notices– signed by the Housing Agency of Jamaica Limited on behalf of the Ministry of Housing– on some of their neighbours.

Nevertheless, they are, by consensus, holding ground.

“We are willing to pay for the property no matter how much it cost, everybody willing to pay. Most of us are working and are willing to get National Housing Trust (NHT) benefits and pay for the land,” Hardia Lawrence Beswick told the Observer West. “We don’t want to wait until they move against us. We want the land to be surveyed and we all get a little piece of paper to deposit. We spend a lot of money to construct this building. We can’t make them come and lick it down”.

The letters read: “You are hereby given notice to immediately quit and deliver up possession of premises being part of Norwood Pen and Paradise Pen in the parish of St James, owned by Barnett Limited, and in the possession of the Ministry of Housing for which you are in illegal occupation.

You are also given notice to immediately remove any building, structure, material or fencing erected or placed by you on the property. Failure to comply will result in you being forcibly removed from the property and secondly any building, structure, material or fencing on the property be removed and, or demolished”.

Beswick, like several other residents living in and around the area which is known as ‘Shanty Town’ have ignored repeated warnings to refrain from building on the property. However Water and Housing Minister Dr Horace Chang who is also the Member of Parliament for the area told the Observer West that while plans are afoot to regularise the informal settlement, about four households situated on land reserved for the expansion of University of the West Indies western Jamaica campus, “will be removed”.

He explained further that a number of the informal tenants, especially those living in a gully have to be relocated as they live in a sections of the community he classified as high-risk environmental areas.

“The ones in the gully have to move. Those people are living where you cannot put any road, water and light. It don’t make sense you put people there. The rest are not affected.

In the meantime, Lawrence-Beswick, a mother of three and who along with her husband set up a concrete structure on a section of the land says she doesn’t want to relocate to the communities of Sammy Bush or Home Hill which she claims have been touted as areas designated for their relocation.

“There is no land that is better for other people than some. They want us to move to Home Hill and Sammy Bush, but we have invested in here and we want to stay right here,” she said.

Dr Chang has promised to meet with the residents this weekend to resolve the issue.