The Minister of Urban and Rural Development is worried about the nine-year slow development of Bukalo Village Council.
Sankwasa reminded the council that the Swapo Party Manifesto stipulates that there is good sanitation, effective water, and electricity supply in municipal areas.
Sankwasa toured the Bukalo Village Council as part of his familiarisation tour, where he insisted on service from the council to the electorate as promised.
He urged councillors to make sure that they allocate land for housing and other development purposes.
Sankwasa was also worried about empty houses at the village council since owners have not been established.
“But, when we start with the construction of houses or whatever, we should already have the occupiers of such houses because we are not going to fall into the trap where houses were built under mass housing, but once the construction is complete, the houses stand for ages because people who are supposed to occupy such houses were not delineated at construction. We must delineate and have a list, a waiting list, that as we complete constructing houses, people must begin occupying those houses.”
He also urged investors in real estate to consider affordability.
Sankwasa also reaffirmed that plots should not be smaller than 300 square metres to provide room for extensions in the future.
“Land in the village council within the limits of the village should never be governed on tribal lines. It should be sold to those who can afford it and who would like to settle in Bukalo, similar to Windhoek or anywhere else in Namibia. As long as you can purchase that plot based on the price set or determined by the village council and can construct.”
He called upon the Council to collaborate with traditional authorities in the process of acquiring land.
Sankwasa has also advised councillors to suspend their political beliefs and work collectively.
The CEO for Bukalo Village Council, Ntwala Sazita, told the minister that the local council is not developing due to a massive list of issues.
“The first of the challenges we have is staff complement, structure. We are building houses here in Bukalo; we lack a works inspector, and we lack qualified personnel in the planning department to conduct that. As a council we receive revenue from land, yet we are paralyzed; we lack a qualified staff in their planning department to aid us.”
The council is also not furnished with an environment officer and faced with a missing smart financial system to trace on the financial report.
There are also no functioning equipment and machines, but the council relies on hiring, which is too costly.