NEW DAR ES SALAAM MASTER PLAN IN TANZANIA

BY AISIA RWEYEMAMU

27th December 2015

  Plan comes into effect next June

Dar es Salaam

A new Dar es Salaam master plan which has just come off the drawing board and is scheduled to be put into effect in June, next year, is likely to see more than 3.6 million Dar es Salaam residents rendered homeless on the ground of encroaching on industrial or residential areas. 

According to the ministry of Lands, Housing and Human Settlements Development, city residents need to brace themselves for massive evictions come next June when the city master  plan comes into effect because only 20 per cent of the residents live in surveyed areas.

A senior ministry official told The Guardian on Sunday that the new master plan would have a lot of changes compared to the previous one which served from 1979 and 1999.

“The lifeline of a city master plan is only 20 years, so the initial city master plan expired in 1999. During the past 16 years Dar es Salaam has been operating without a settlement plan,” the ministry’s Acting Director of Rural and Town Planning, Prof. John Lupala, told this paper recently.

With an estimated population of 4.5 million people, most of them living in squatter or unplanned areas, many houses built in non-surveyed areas or those which have been lined up for other purposes other than residence, will be deemed to have encroached on the areas and therefore liable to demolition.

Prof. Lupala said that most people bought plots for residence by only involving local government authorities without being aware of the central government’s plans for the relevant areas. 

He elaborated that it had taken the ministry more than two years to prepare the new master plan and it would accommodate all developments and changes made in the city.

“We are in the final stages of completing the new master plan which is expected to be rolled out in June, next year,” he said.

The Rural and Town Planning director said that upon expiry of the Dar es Salaam master plan in 1999, the city council came up with a Strategic Urban Development Plan in 2002, but it was not approved by the ministry to be used as a city master plan.

He noted however that even the old master plan had revealed massive encroachment of residential buildings, industrial and commercial structures on areas not earmarked for those purposes.

Dr Lupala pointed out that there had been construction of homes in swampy areas or those close to rivers and the sea shore, in open spaces and even in industrial areas, saying it was in contravention of the old master plan. 

“All the people who built in areas not meant for human settlement and without the go-ahead from the Lands ministry will be deemed as invaders,” he said.

He also pointed out that a number of surveyed areas in Dar es Salaam had also been invaded and developed without following laid down legal procedures, saying from next year the government would provide a copy of the city master plan to all local government offices for execution to avert encroachment of non-surveyed land.

 “People should build the culture of visiting the ministry of Lands to seek advice on the planned use of the plots of land they intend to purchase before they actually by it,” he warned, adding that most local government officials were not conversant with the new city master plan.

The government is acting tough to ensure the old city master plan is adhered to prior to coming into force of the new one. In some areas of the city, permits to construct homes in open spaces and in swampy areas were issued owing to corruption.

A source in the Lands ministry who preferred anonymity, said, “If you take the area of Tabata in Ilala district, a major part of the area was earmarked as a residential settlement for government employees. 

“Tabata Aroma, until now, is for National Social Security Fund (NSSF) employees while Bima had been earmarked for National Insurance Corporation staff, with Magengeni being reserved for NSSF quarters.

“Tabata Sigara, on the other hand, was earmarked for Tanzania-Zambia Railway (Tazara) and Tanzania Cigarette Company staff, whereas Chang’ombe was reserved for VETA and Tanzania Elimu Supplies staff.”

He said the areas had since been invaded by other people because they were left undeveloped for a long time by the assigned government institutions.

According to him, a place such as Mbezi in Kinondoni district had originally been earmarked for industrial purposes, but now most of the land had fallen into the hands of invaders and turned into a residential area, with posh homes dotting its landscape. 

Last week, many Dar es Salaam residents were left homeless after the ministries of Lands and Environment, in collaboration with Kinondoni Municipal Council, demolished hundreds of homes illegally put up in the floods-prone Msimbazi valley. 

The government has declared a moratorium of the demolitions until next month when the exercise is to resume in the valley stretching from Kinondoni municipality to Pugu, where more than 8,000 houses are set to be demolished.

The exercise will also see structures illegally constructed in open spaces or close to water sources or the sea shore in Mwenge, Kinondoni Biafra and Sinza suburbs pulled down.

SOURCE: GUARDIAN ON SUNDAY