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Thursday, July 31, 2025

Granny whose home collapsed gets land, house

by

56 days ago
20250605
Grandmother Geneive Pierre and her daughter sit in the doorway of  their collapsed home at South Oropouche on May 30.

Grandmother Geneive Pierre and her daughter sit in the doorway of their collapsed home at South Oropouche on May 30.

RISTIAN DE SILVA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Prais­ing God for her bless­ings, grand­moth­er Geneive Pierre broke down in tears af­ter learn­ing that a Good Samar­i­tan had of­fered to pur­chase land and build a house for her af­ter hers col­lapsed last Mon­day.

Pierre re­ceived the news from Siparia May­or Dood­nath Mayrhoo, who has been pro­vid­ing food and sup­port for the fam­i­ly. Checks re­vealed that the land where she was liv­ing be­longed to a busi­ness­man from south Trinidad.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, Pierre said she was thank­ful to fi­nal­ly have a place to call her own. She lives with her eight-year-old daugh­ter and nine-year-old grand­son and has been strug­gling since the death of her hus­band Gre­go­ry two years ago.

Pierre had used her last sav­ings of $25,000 to buy a small ply­wood house in South Oropouche af­ter she was un­able to pay rent. How­ev­er, the ply­wood house col­lapsed last Mon­day, leav­ing her and the chil­dren home­less.

Af­ter Guardian Me­dia high­light­ed her sto­ry, May­or Mayrhoo re­spond­ed to the fam­i­ly’s sit­u­a­tion and arranged for the dam­aged struc­ture to be de­mol­ished. He or­gan­ised for Pierre and the chil­dren to be giv­en tem­po­rary shel­ter at the Oropouche Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre.

Mayrhoo said he had spo­ken to a lawyer and the land pur­chase will be fi­nalised in the com­ing weeks. He said he ex­pect­ed that the fam­i­ly would move in­to their new home by the end of June. He al­so thanked every­one who of­fered as­sis­tance.

Pierre said once the home is re­built, she hopes her fam­i­ly can be re­unit­ed. Af­ter her hus­band’s death, her 21-year-old son be­gan ex­pe­ri­enc­ing de­pres­sion. Her el­dest daugh­ter, the moth­er of the nine-year-old boy, left home, and Pierre has not heard from her for sev­er­al years.

Min­is­ter of the Peo­ple and So­cial De­vel­op­ment, Van­dana Mo­hit, who al­so re­spond­ed to the fam­i­ly’s plight has been pro­vid­ing coun­selling sup­port through Na­tion­al Fam­i­ly Ser­vices.

Any­one wish­ing to as­sist can call Pierre at 278-1206 or May­or Mayrhoo at 751-3565.


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