Sh15bn World Bank plan for slums

Photo/FILE
Residents fighting fire which destroyed over 5,000 houses in Mukuru-Mariguini, Mukuru-Kanaro, Mukuru-Chakati, Mukuru Fuata-Nyayo and Mukuru slums in South B, Nairobi, on February 28, 2011. The World Bank plans to improve infrastructure in slums.

Deep in Nairobi’s Fuata Nyayo slums, open sewers are part of landmarks. They carry human waste, condoms, polythene bags and all filth.

They pass no more than three metres from people’s shanties. Yet these are also the children’s playgrounds.

Residents have come to accept this as part of their environment, with dire consequences.

Ms Annet Wamaitha, a resident of this is slum since 2004 says that she can’t remember the number of times she has had diarrhoea, but says has no choice but to live in this condition.

“When you live here, you have to tune your body to get used to it,” she says.

Towns’ face-lift

But that might change soon for the better. In a new programme launched early this week, Kenya’s major towns are set to have a face-lift to improve living conditions in slums.

The project called Kenya Informal Settlement Improvement Programme (KISIP) will start officially in August and will be funded mainly by the World Bank.

Some 15 municipalities have been identified, where roads within their slums, drainage, water provision and proper land use system will be improved to reduce poverty.

The project will target slums in Nairobi, Mombasa, Kisumu, Nakuru, and Eldoret. Other towns include Naivasha, Thika, Nyeri, Garissa, Malindi and Kakamega.

The Bank will provide a loan of $100 million (about Sh8.9 billion). Other financiers include Sweden, which will give $10 million (Sh890 million), and France ($45 million or about Sh4 billion).

The Kenyan government will provide non-monetary support through staff and supervision to the tune of Sh1.5 billion, bringing the total cost to Sh15 billion.

Under the project, the government will use the funds to recruit and train staff who will be charged with drawing up maps to subdivide plots, supply water and create throughways to aid rescue efforts and ease movement.

However, the five-year programme comes as a challenge to the government as it emerged that close to a third of Kenya’s 40 million people now live in urban areas, whose pressure for housing and safe environment is already overwhelming.

Eyes are now set on the government to see if it will be up to the task. First, the programme intends to give the residents the power to develop land on which they live, by giving them titles.

That means that slums need to be planned. Surveyors need to draw up maps on how these areas will be subdivided and determine how allotment letters will be given. But there are no guidelines on how mapping shall be done.

Lands Minister James Orengo told reporters on Monday that “all public land that was available has been, most of it, taken (illegally).” This implies that slum absentee landlords might resist any move of subdivision.

The fact that no new law has been enacted to ease land acquisition and reduce grabbing might also mean that the grabbers will simply go ahead to produce documents to prove ownership.

“In Kenya today, these projects have become so difficult to implement because of land being acquired primitively through grabbing and used as commercial capital,” said Mr Orengo.

And although Mr Orengo added that “a title is as good as it is”, there are already conflicting court judgments on whether a title deed can actually be invalidated by a government authority other than courts themselves.

The first challenge for the programme will hence be that of individuals using the law to stall the project through court battles.

Still, there is the hurdle of moving populations to pave way for construction. Going by history, political interference could be something to expect.

A recent programme to evict people from the Mau water tower elicited opposition from local MPs who accused the government of putting people in the cold.

Slums on the other hand carry a huge number of voters and politicians may not want to lose them. Already, Housing assistant minister Bishop Margaret Wanjiru has declared that she would not support the programme if it will involve evicting people.

“The project is noble, but I would not allow anyone to evict my people. When it comes to evictions, I will always be on the side of my people,” she said on Monday. Mathare slums are among those informal settlements in her constituency.

Mr Shitanda on his part maintained that no one would be evicted, but was categorical that certain areas will require that people move.

“We will only relocate, but we will not evict. But to create through-ways, you sometimes need evictions,” he told reporters. To create a road through dense shanties, they will have to be removed.

However, the Institution of Surveyors of Kenya argues that one doesn’t need to move people to improve drainage.

According to ISK Chair Collins K’Owuor, the government can construct underground drainage, which will pass sewer as people live above them.

“ This type of drainage does not affect those living on it. I think the best thing is to first educate the people about the importance of the programme.”
The government says it will have to involve the affected communities to succeed.