Venezuelan government to deliver 4200 houses to homeless

Some 4,200 Venezuelan families now without a home will be given a new house by December, Housing Minister Ricardo Molina said Monday. The move is part of the government's Great Housing Scheme that aims to build three million housing units by the end of 2019, as planned by late President Hugo Chavez. Heavy downpours at the end of 2010 and the start of 2011 left as many as 40,000 families, or 130,000 people, homeless, and they have been living like refugees in government shelters, said Molina. "We are concluding this chapter ..." Molina said, noting that 80 percent of the families in the shelters have already been attended to, and those who lived in high-risk areas have also benefited from the housing program. Since 2011, the government has delivered 466,245 housing units to as many families throughout the country, the minister said. The country's housing ambition goes hand in hand with the government's plan to industrialize the construction sector, he said. "We are speeding up industrialization to guarantee we meet the goal of building three million houses by the end of President Nicolas Maduro's term" in office, Molina said.