Francine Black, Staff Reporter

September usually heralds a new beginning for students, however for one 16-year-old, it was the time her life was forcibly put on hold because of a near death car accident.

Onieka Taylor, a lower sixth student of St. Jago High who lives in Cudjoe Hill, St. Catherine, ended up in hospital two weeks into the new school year. But her new classmates, who had known her for just those two weeks, have come to her aid, to help make her journey to recovery short and successful.

The STAR recieved a number of letters from students of St. Jago, all asking for a charity concert to help raise funds for Onieka and another student, Ransford Roper.

"This concert could be a great way for my club to raise money in order to donate to two members of our school who are in need of operations," Adrian Scott wrote. "Onieka Taylor met in an accident and needs two surgical pins for her legs."

Kayla White, wrote:

"This concert would be in aid of providing support to a student which was a victim of the fatal & gruesome accident...even with our generous contribution we don't think we will raise the money in time to save her legs"

The letters were responses to the newspaper's 'Artiste of the Month' feature which offered the concert to a school. This month's artistes, dancers Timeless, Ravers Clavers, Sample Six, Shelly Belly and Black Blingas and other entertainers will perform to raise funds for Onieka and Ransford.

"I am surprised yet grateful to know that they would do this for me although they haven't known me very long," Onieka told THE STAR of her St Jago peers.

Onieka, who gained seven CXC subjects at Jonathan Grant High School, had gone to sixth form at St. Jago, to better qualify herself for university where she had hoped to study to become a computer analyst.

But on that ill-fated evening she was on her way home from Spanish Town when the taxi she was in was hit by a pick-up along the Guanoboa Vale main road near Kitson Town, St. Catherine.

Four people were killed in that accident. Oneika escaped with her life, but not without serious injuries to her legs, leaving one needing reconstructive surgery and the other requiring two pins, each costing $70,000.

The accident has forced her to sit out the remainder of the school year as it will take several months before she is capable of walking well again.

Onieka's accident was another trial for Gwendolywn Harrison, her mother, who almost lost everything between August and September this year.

"When the storm blow, my house blow down and the likkle money that I had to fix it up now spend at the hospital," she said.

She built a one room concrete structure since the storm, but the funds to put on the slab roof have been difficult to find now that she also has to pay Onieka's medical expenses. Her only means of earning a living have been a one day household job she has had for 14 years. Because of severe burns, which disfigured her when she was a child, Harrison has found it difficult to get jobs.

It is the support of St. Jago and Jonathan Grant High schools, as well as the Church of Jesus Christ Apostolic that is getting her through the rough times.

Despite the struggles ahead, Onieka remains hopeful that she will soon get the surgery and be able to go home. "People have been very supportive. People from Jonathan Grant have been to visit me. One day a bus load of students from St Jago came to see me and they help to give me more strength until mi come out," she said.