Woman, 4 kids seek proper home

'Me daughter ask when we ago get somewhere better and we just start cry.'

Tamara Bailey photos - Philisha Powell stands before her house, which is slowly deteriorating.

A shower is a luxury Powell cannot afford, instead, this zinc structure is used as a bathroom.

At a glance this would look like a shed to most persons, but this is actually the kitchen area where Powell prepares her meals.

Tamara Bailey, Star Writer

In the small community of Brockery in Christiana, Manchester, sitting atop a mountain of partially hardened soil and a few concrete blocks, is a frail wooden and zinc structure, unfit for human living and showing blinding signs of disrepair.

But this is home for Philisha Powell, 40, and her four children.

Constantly worrying about which section of the one-room abode to place the bed when it rains or which neighbour to seek shelter from during storm-like weather, Powell says her 36 years of living at the house have been a constant struggle.

"I really need a house because me not living anywhere now; no proper kitchen and no proper bathroom; di likkle one room nuh have no partition, and me know me children dem cyan comfortable," she said.

The dwelling, situated on family lands, was given to her by her aunt, with whom she once lived.

"Me auntie that me use to live with and that live overseas now give me this place and tell me say me must do anything I want to do with it because she not coming back out here, but I haven't been able to put up a better structure. one time the MP (Member of Parliament) did promise we likkle help, but dat nuh fall through at all," she revealed.

With no real income-earning opportunities, Powell relies solely on domestic work that may turn up once per week. "Is likkle washing me do fi survive enuh, but that nuh come often and when it come me haffi do what me can fi me kids cuz all a dem go school. one is 14; one is 13; one is 11; and the last one is 9, and di fathers nuh so present so you haffi say a me one."

If the notion that once one is born in hardships it follows them throughout were in fact true, then the mother of four would see her situation as destiny.

"The struggles real from me born, a ina waa bath a shop piazza me born and me mother give me to stranger before me auntie take me at four, not even birth paper me nuh have". life rough man but me know better deh," she said. "Sometimes me look pon me children and ask God fi deliver me. More time me daughter say 'mommy a when we ago get somewhere better fi live', and we just start to cry. we nuh like di situation but we haffi work wid it."

With nothing to do some days but lay her head on a mattress that has been worn out and requires old clothes to be stuffed inside, Powell prays that a good Samaritan will help her get a house and a little job to sustain her family.

"Me wi work enuh; if I get work I will work. I tried building a pen once fi raise some animals but the material I had couldn't work, but me nah stop try," she assured.

Pastor of the Great Commission Apostolic church, Basil Barnaby, said church members will be working on Philisha's house as a Labour Day project. He said her situation needs the help of corporate Jamaica.

"We will be doing all we can but we need the help of corporate Jamaica, this cannot just be a Labour Day project, it needs more focus and significant resources. She has promising children and I'm imploring all those who are reading this to help in any way they can," he said, adding that they plan to build a decent structure and start her off with a fowl coop and chickens so she can generate some income.

People interested in contributing labour or materials can contact Pastor Barnaby at 420-0113 or 335-1435 or make donations through the church to Victioria Mutual Building Society (VMBS) Mandeville branch account number 400712469.