KINGSTON, Jamaica, Oct 22, CMC – Prime Minister Andrew Holness is urging landowners with unused property in developed areas to consider selling it to the Government to help expand housing opportunities for vulnerable Jamaicans.
Holness made the appeal on Wednesday during the handover of two-family housing units under the New Social Housing Programme (NSHP) in Greendale, Bull Bay, in St. Andrew East Rural.
He said access to suitable land remained a challenge for many Jamaicans who had not inherited property and were seeking to secure homes, contributing to an increase in illegal land occupation, commonly known as squatting.
“In my opinion, this is a good way to achieve social justice and equity,” Holness said. “There are many Jamaicans who had no endowment, meaning they have no asset that they would have gotten as an inheritance from their parents or their family, and they are seeking to have endowment.”
He called on landowners who had migrated or no longer intended to use their property to approach the Government about selling land suitable for housing.
Holness said acquiring more usable land for the NSHP could help ease some of the social tensions associated with land settlement.
He reiterated that beneficiaries must own land or have permission to use it under a long-term lease or other ownership arrangement before the Government builds a house for them.
Speaker of the House and Member of Parliament for St Andrew East Rural Juliet Holness also highlighted the difficulty of finding suitable sites for the programme in her constituency, citing the location of applicants, hilly terrain and a lack of land ownership among some prospective beneficiaries.
She appealed to Jamaicans at home and abroad who own suitable land to contact the Government.
“I do not want even one opportunity for a house for a resident to go, because we can’t find suitable land,” she said, urging landowners willing to sell to get in touch with her office or community representatives.
“We don’t want a single house to go to waste,” she added.
CMC/ed/2026