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Final Report for the Malawi Cities Forum on City Wide
Slum Upgrading
Building bridges: Communities Working With Government in City Wide Planning
and Development
February 2012
Prepared and submitted to CCODE by:
Mrs Vera Kamtukule
P.O Box 3154
Lilongwe
Email: [email protected]
Cell: 0999566648
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This report outlines the events at the community dissemination workshop as well as the Malawi
Cities forum on city wide slum upgrading that took place at Bridge View Hotel in Lilongwe
Malawi from 23rd – 25th January, 2012. The workshops were organized by the Centre for
Community organization and Development (CCODE) in partnership with the Malawi Homeless
People’s Federation (MHPF) and the Shack/Slum Dwellers International (SDI). The report
outlines the presentations, remarks that were made at these events including the questions and
answers and lessons learnt from the workshops.
The aim of the community dissemination workshop was to assist in refocusing Government and
other organizations’ approach on how grassroots communities can take part in their settlement
development. On the other hand, the main objective for the cities forum was to see how
communities can work with Government, NGOs in citywide planning and Development. The
workshops drew participation from Local Authorities, NGOs, Federations and the Academia
from Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Malawi and Pakistan.
From all the presentations that were made at the workshops, it was very clear that the
challenges that the poor face in slum/informal settlements in their respective cities are the
similar and that efforts to address the same sustainably should involve the active participation
of the communities themselves. It was also noted that a successful slum upgrading programme
requires the development of partnerships between the communities that are organized e.g. the
Federations and other stakeholders like NGOs, the Academia and the Local Authorities.
The Forum concluded that the communities have several roles in city wide slum upgrading the
major ones being mobilization, profiling, enumeration and communication of results to
stakeholders. The role of NGOs in city wide upgrading on the other hand is to support local
community leaders on social mobilization both technically and financially taking into
consideration cultural aspects of the communities; as well as bridge the communication gap
between communities themselves and resource wielding institutions like the Government,
donors and other stakeholders. The key role of the local authorities in city wide upgrading is to
design city plans from the view point of communities, this may entails constant engagement
with the same and may at times result into lowering of standards to suit people’s affordability
e.g. as in the case of MHPF, the reduction of standard plot sizes. Lastly, the report states that
the role of the Academia in city wide upgrading is among others to ensure that their education
system is benefitting the general public and that they are accountable to people including the
poor. This may therefore require a change in the entire education system to engage students
with communities to address real life challenges in housing, sanitation and so on as part of their
training programme.
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Table of Contents 1.0 Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………………….…9
1.1 Day 1: Community Dissemination Workshop………………………………………10 1.2 ISN Mtandire and Chinsapo Presentations………………………………………….10 1.3 Mtandire Slum Upgrading Presentation……………………………………………..11 1.4 Chinsapo Slum Upgrading Presentation……………………………………………...11 1.5 Question and Answer Time…………………………………………………………………14 1.6 Closing Remarks By Mr. Ted Nandolo, CEO, Blantyre City Council….….15
2.0 Day 2: Malawi Cities Forum on City Wide Upgrading………………………………….17
2.1 Presentations from Local Authorities by Costly Chanza……………………….17 2.2 Question and Answer Time…………………………………………………………………19 2.3 Presentation from South Africa…………………………………………………………..20 2.4 Presentation from South Africa ISN…………………………………………………….21 2.5 Presentation from Cape Town…………………………………………………………….21 2.6 Presentation from Namibia…………………………………………………………….…..22 2.7 Second Presentation from Namibia…………………………………………………….22 2.8 Question and Answer Time…………………………………………………………………23 2.9 Zimbabwe Presentation ISN………………………………………………………………..26 2.10 Zambia Presentation……………………………………………………………….26 2.11 Group Discussions……………………………………………………………………26 2.12 Zimbabwe Group Discussion Presentation……………………………….27 2.13 Namibia Group Presentation……………………………………………………27 2.14 Blantyre Group Presentations………………………………………………….28 2.15 Lilongwe Group Presentations…………………………………………………28 2.16 Mzuzu Group Presentations…………………………………………………….28 2.17 Closing Remarks by Mphatso Njunga………………………………………29
3.0 Day 3: Cities Forum, Final Day……………………………………………………………………..30
3.1 The role of Communities in city wide planning…………………………………..31 3.2 The role of Local Authorities and Government in Planning…………………32 3.3 The role of the Academia in planning beyond books & conferences…..33 3.4 Question and Answer Time…………………………………………………………………34 3.5 Closing Remarks by PS Mrs Ivy Luhanga……………………………………………..38 3.6 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………………..39
Appendix
List of forum participants and their contacts………………………………………….40
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ACRONYMS
ADB African Development Bank
CCODE Centre for Community Organization and Development
DIG Development Innovations Group
ECOSAN Ecological Sanitation
EU European Union
ISN Informal Settlement Network
MDG Millennium Development Goals
MGDS Malawi Growth and Development Strategy
MHPF Malawi Homeless People’s Federation
PSUP Participatory Slum Upgrading Programme
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“If the public is weak, then there will be no Public Private Partnerships”
(Arif Hasan, 25th January 2012, Malawi Cities forum on City Wide Slum Upgrading)
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PROGRAM: COMMUNITY DISSEMINATION WORKSHOP – Monday 23rd January 2012
Morning: Arrival of Delegates from other Cities
2.00 pm Opening Prayer 2.10 pm Opening Remarks – Lackson Phiri, Community leader 2.20 pm Presentation of Cluster Development Plans by the Mtandire ISN 2.50 pm Discussions 3.10 pm Mtandire Batik Centre 3.15 pm Health Break
3.30 pm Presentation of Cluster Development Plans by the Chinsapo ISN 4.30 pm Discussions 5.00pm Closing remarks- ISUP Manager, Mr. Aggrey Kawonga
Project Brief
SUSTAINABLE IMPROVEMENT OF LIVELIHOOD OF THE MARGINALIZED AND VULNERABLE
POPULATION OF LILONGWE CITY: AN INTEGRATED APPROACH TO URBAN PLANNING. (The
Informal Settlement Upgrading Project) funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
The Informal Settlement Upgrading Project under the Lilongwe City Council seeks to assist in
refocusing Government and other organizations approach on how grassroots communities can
take part in their settlement development. This approach is being piloted in Mtandire and
Chinsapo Informal Settlements. These communities will present their cluster development
plans after profiling and enumerating their settlements.
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PROGRAM: MALAWI CITIES FORUM ON CITY WIDE SLUM UPGRADING
BUILDING BRIDGES: COMMUNITIES WORKING WITH GOVERNMENT IN
CITYWIDE PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT
Bridgeview Hotel. Lilongwe. 24th January to 25th January 2012
Tuesday January 24th
8:30 am Opening Prayer
8.35 am Introductions
8.45am Opening remarks – Mr. Kelvin M’mangisa, LCC C.E.O.
9.00 am Presentation from Mzuzu, Blantyre, Lilongwe and Zomba: Cities explain what they are
doing on slum upgrading. Costly Chanza, Director of Planning from Blantyre City
Assembly presents on behalf of all cities.
10:30 am Health break
10.45am Presentation from South Africa, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe
12:30 pm Lunch
1:30 pm Group discussion on the understanding on slum upgrading: role of community, process
orientation and partnership building with local authorities
3.15pm Health Break
3.30pm Country Presentations on discussions
5:00 pm Closing remarks: Mphatso Njunga
Wednesday January 25:
9:30am Opening Prayer
9.35 am Opening Remarks by Principal Secretary- Lands, Housing and Urban Development
10:00 am Introducing Mr. Arif Hasan – Mr. Jack Makau, SDI
10:20 am Health break
10:25 am Session 1: The role of Communities in citywide planning, by Mr. Arif Hasan
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11:45 am Feedback/ discussions on session 1
12:00 pm Lunch
1:30 pm Session 2: Local Authorities and Government: by Mr. Arif Hasan
2:15 pm Feedback/ discussion on Session 2
3:00 pm Health Break
3:30 pm Session 3: Academia - Planning beyond books and conference papers by Arif Hasan)
4.00 pm Feedback/discussion on Session 3
4:30pm Country/City Action Plans
5:10 pm Closing Remarks and Launch of Urban Profiles – Mrs Ivy Luhanga, Principal Secretary,
Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Management
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1.0 Introduction
On a global scale, poverty is rapidly urbanizing and the urban poor are generally excluded from
services and employment making them highly vulnerable to unexpected shocks of life e.g. loss
of income, natural disasters, illnesses and deaths among others. In addition, access to adequate
and affordable housing remains unattainable for a larger group of urban dwellers not only in
Malawi, but across the world, as is evidenced by a multiplication of informal settlements, slums,
and poorly served and over crowded tenements housing. In many countries, housing policies
and subsidized housing programmes have often failed; giving room for participatory slum
upgrading programmes with a focus of developing existing communities and regularization of
the same. Such efforts therefore require the design and implementation of integrated,
participatory and holistic urban social policies; with the poor themselves being at the centre of
such initiatives.
In this regard, the Malawi Homeless People’s Federation (MHPF) with funding from the Bill and
Melinda Gates Foundation and technical support from the Centre for Community Organization
and Development, the Shack Dwellers International and the Lilongwe City Council piloted an
Informal Settlement Upgrading Project in Mtandire and Chinsapo. The aim of the project was
to refocus government and other organization’s approach on how grassroots communities can
take part in the development of their settlements. The process involved the profiling as well as
the enumeration of the two communities and later the development of cluster plans for the
same. On 23rd January 2012, the communities presented their plans to stakeholders at a
community dissemination function held at Bridge View Hotel in Lilongwe ahead of a Malawi
Cities Forum of Slum Upgrading under the theme Bridging Bridges: communities working with
Government in citywide planning and Development at the same venue from the 24th to 25th
January 2012.
This report outlines the events of the three days and highlights the challenges the urban poor
face and their consequent solutions. The report draws together key lessons and
recommendations for the way forward that emanated from the presenters who came from
Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Pakistan and the host, Malawi. Participation from
each country involved communities, academics, city councils/municipalities, NGOs and other
Government departments.
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1.1 Day 1: Community Dissemination Workshop for the pilot informal settlement
upgrading in Mtandire and Chinsapo
The Director of Ceremony on this day was Mr Hunga. The day started with a word of prayer
from Mrs Modesta Kaphala. All the guests from visiting countries and Malawi were introduced
and Mr Lackson Phiri, a community Leader from Area 49 gave his opening remarks highlighting
the theme as well as the objectives of the workshop and the fact that this forum was the first of
its kind in Malawi. Mr Phiri also introduced the Informal Settlement Network (ISN) concept and
described its objectives and ways of operation. Translations on the day were done by Mr Patrick
Chikoti.
As stated earlier, the Slum upgrading programme in Lilongwe is being funded by DIG and
coordinated by Lilongwe City Council with the assistance from the Centre for Community
Organization and Development (CCODE) in alliance with the Malawi Homeless People’s
Federation through the ISNs. The ISN however is not a decision making body but only
coordinates and assists data gathering, assessment and monitoring. For this programme to
succeed there is need for continued cooperation among the stakeholders to fulfil the objectives
of the Slum Upgrading Project. Lessons in enumerations and clustering were drawn from
exchange visits to other Countries like Kenya, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
1.2 ISN Mtandire and Chinsapo Presentations
ISN Lilongwe emphasized the importance of exchange visits in Malawi and other ISN
participating countries and the fact that cooperation should have been established earlier in
the project among stakeholders and supporting countries. Their presentation focused on the
current situation in their communities at cluster level, regarding drainages, sanitation, waste
management, housing, accessibility and water supply among others. They also described the
community involvement and process and how people bring together ideas to find affordable
and lasting solutions to their problems; a process which starts by a thorough assessment and
profiling of the present situation that acts as a basis for development planning. Printed
documents of the Draft Mtandire and Chinsapo Enumeration Reports and Field Note: Use of
Ecosan Products in Malawi: Experiences from Users in Peri-Urban areas 2011 issue were
distributed to participants.
1.3 Mtandire Slum Upgrading Project Presentation
Titled “The current situations and the best way forward” and presented by Senior Group
Village Headman Chigoneka. The following were the major aspects of the presentation:
Brief background of Mtandire Informal Settlement- A community habited by poor
people with high levels of unemployment
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Initial uncertainties and fear upon the objectives of the slum upgrading projects to the
areas in Mtandire since many people thought the project would lead to mass evictions
from the current informal settlements.
Role of discussions and negotiations among the stake holders facilitated by MHPF and
CCODE; it was understood that the project was aimed at improving the living conditions
of the people within the settlement.
The areas involved in the pilot project are usually not included in the development
plans of the Lilongwe City Council
The major challenges faced by the poor in Mtandire include:
Poor Drainages
River flooding
Settlement accessibility challenges due to flooded footpaths connecting near by
communities thus creating problems when people from one community want to go to
another e.g. from Mtandire to Mtsiliza especially during the rainy season
Vandalized water kiosks, high populations leading to pressure on kiosks and use of
unprotected water resources throughout Mtandire settlement
Poor sanitation throughout the settlement; bathrooms and pit latrines are in poor state
Waste management problems as most of the waste in Mtandire is left unattended and
unmoving drains that create a good breeding environment for mosquitoes causing the
area to have high rates of cholera/diarrhoea and malaria cases respectively
Proposed community solutions:
Construct drainage system for waste water and rain water as most of the households do
not have proper drainage system for the flow of waste and rain water.
Construction of a dike and plant trees and grass along Chimbalame River which usually
floods during the rainy season.
Constructions of foot bridges to connect to other settlements like Piyasani Settlement.
Constructions of protected and adequate water kiosks
Constructions of household and market bathrooms and latrines e.g. Ecosan toilets with
an attached bathroom complete with hand washing facilities
Waste management through training with the federations members that could also lead
to making manure which could bring income to the beneficiaries
Paved foot paths, improved bridges that create easy access to Mtandire
Due to the high unemployment rates and poverty levels, livelihood initiatives e.g.
handicrafts could be an option for income generation
Training and acquiring skills in various disciplines
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Conclusion and way forward for Mtandire Community
This arrangement is for Mtandire and other clusters will undergo the same processes. What
Mtandire aspires as a community is to develop a person at that cluster-lower level while also
looking at the settlement level development. Settlement level development mostly is medium
to long term. And this approach seeks to tackle the challenges from angles, cluster and
settlement level.
After the Mtandire presentation, the participants had a break for refreshments for 15 minutes
Batik Presentation by Happiness Zidana (Batik Centre)
The Batik Centre is an entrepreneurship venture between CCODE and MHPF. Upon realizing the
challenges that women from Mtandire and Area 49 were facing due to absence of or very
unstable income sources, women got together and decided to take part in a year-long training
without any incentives in order to learn the necessary skills. After completing the training which
was being facilitated by CCODE, they received certificates and since then, they are producing
Batiks. Participants were then allowed to go outside to view the women’s products and make
purchases to support the same.
1.4 Chinsapo Informal Settlement Upgrading Presentation
Titled “Current conditions and cluster development proposals” and presented by Mr.
Chinsamba. Mr Chinsamba started by giving a brief history of Chinsapo that the community:
Started with a small village but now has many settlements (villages) which are informal
Chinsapo covers 5-6 Square Kilometres and has about 65,000 people
The population of Chinsapo is dominated by the Chewa tribe
Process of information gathering
Enumerations, profiling, mapping and clustering
To reduce the size of informal settlement in need for upgrading, Chinsapo was divided
into smaller clusters.
Currently there are 13 clusters- named Cluster A to M. cluster A is the starting point of
the upgrading project in Chinsapo
The major Challenges faced by the poor in Chinsapo include:
Poor roads and drainages
Poor public infrastructures such as bus stage, market, water kiosks mostly which are
vandalized and no public toilets.
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The market which services the entire Chinsapo informal settlement are in bad shape-
food items placed on ground, no hygiene, and healthy facilities.
City council does not collect waste from informal settlement and Cholera and malaria
come as the result of these wastes
Poor housing qualities in the settlement
Proposed community solutions
Self help initiatives
Paving of roads and footpaths
Training of ISN members in waste management in collaboration with City Council as an
income generation activity
Construction of Ecosan toilets and bathrooms with hand-washing facilities with the
assistance of Federation members and other Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs)
Provision of home improvement loans within Chinsapo as this will improve the housing
standards and qualities
Train household members on the importance of savings to initiate small upgrading
projects within their surrounding(Savings options; Bank mkhonde and Lupenu)
Train informal settlers with various skills to generate income
Train women in livelihood initiatives since women are the ones who deal with
household challenges in the family
Development needs to start in clusters than in larger areas at once, this will improve the
overall development through experience
Options have to be initiated by the very same poor people
Conclusion
The people of Chinsapo agreed to approach development from cluster level then to settlement
level under the understanding that experiences gained in the process will assist in tackling
bigger and settlement level initiatives. They did not ignore settlement level initiatives but
realize that these are long term processes requiring huge amounts of resources. While waiting
for such big projects, small development projects with smaller budgets can be initiated.
1.5 Question and Answer Time
South Africa
Acknowledged the initiative of the community members in the processes of improving
the living situation of the people in the informal settlement; they wanted to know
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however how do they unite among themselves to be able to speak with one voice in the
projects of slum upgrading
Answer
Namibia
Within the informal settlement are there any other programs doing almost the similar
projects to slum upgrading?
Answer:
What does the acronym CDC mean?
Answer: CDC stands for Community Development Committee
South Africa Johannesburg to Chinsapo ISN
As I heard from your presentation 65,000 is a big number how do you organize and
manage all the people for the projects?
Answer: It is true the population of Chinsapo is big; however ISN has used the existing
community authorities to mobilize the communities. Furthermore ISN and Federation use
cluster system to divide the large community into clusters. ISN also engages and negotiates
with the local leaders and convinces them on the benefits that the slum upgrading projects
will bring to their settlements
Zambia
Would like to know the relationships among City Authorities and Communities and ISN
works
Answer:
- ISN is just one year old and there are many challenges that still exist and through
experiences, ISN hopes to improve on all the short-falls.
- ISN is not a decision making body in the slum upgrading project but a coordinating
section of all the stakeholders involved in the projects. Within any relationships
especially in this manner of project challenges will always be there but the best way to
solve these challenges is to sit down and discuss and then document all agreements and
responsibilities.
What are the legal procedures of upgrading Cities and Towns, are there any city and
town regulations to guide the slum upgrading processes?
When do informal settlements change to be called formal settlement?
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Answer:
- Emphasized the need for poor people to have a platform to express their problems at
the City Councils meetings and that ISN and Federation take plans to the City Council
rather than the City Officials bringing plans to the informal settlements.
- The ISN, Federation, CCODE and Lilongwe City Council use the Bottom-Up approach to
put across the project plans and proposals. Furthermore CCODE use this approach to
give the beneficiaries a platform to be heard outlining the standards and qualities that
are suitable to them.
- Bottom-Up approach enforces the credibility of the projects and usually this leads to
members taking much responsibility and interests in the projects.
- From City Official: the Lilongwe City Council is using pilot phases to draw experiences
that assist in improving the development of cities and towns around Malawi.
1.6 Closing remarks by Mr Ted Nandolo, CEO, Blantyre City Council
Mrs Siku Nkhoma welcomed and invited the Chief Executive for the Blantyre City Council, Mr
Ted Nandolo to give closing remarks for the community dissemination workshop. In his
remarks, Mr Nandolo started by thanking the organizers of the workshop for a job well done.
He stated that the majority of the people are poor in the cities of Malawi therefore cannot
afford the high standards of housings in the urban centres. In Malawi there are high levels of
urbanization- people moving from rural areas to cities because of employment opportunities
that cities and towns offer. However due to the inadequacy of accommodation people are
forced to stay in informal settlements and a lot of people are living on limited resources
because of high population numbers within the informal settlements.
Based on this background, Mr Nandolo stated that the role of City Council therefore is to
facilitate in the city wide slum upgrading projects and that development plans should be
initiated by the people themselves and Council should be there to guide in the implementations
processes through the course of the slum upgrading. Furthermore for any development to take
place people must have interest in the projects themselves.
One of the important aspects of reducing the levels of poverty in the country has to be sourced
from entrepreneurship and savings. He added that it is rather unfortunate that City Councils in
Malawi have not incorporated savings in their budget activities. Saving should therefore be
encouraged in all aspects of life especially in the process of improving the welfare of people
living in the informal settlements. He further stated that currently City councils do not have
budgets that include the city wide slum upgrading activities and that it is therefore important
therefore to emphasize on resource mobilization to support these kinds of projects that
improve the living standards of people in informal settlements throughout the country.
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After the closing remarks Mrs Winnie Jalasi a community leader from Blantyre closed the
workshop with a word of prayer.
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2.0 Day 2: Malawi Cities Forum on City Wide Slum Upgrading under the theme Building
Bridges: communities working with government in citywide planning and development
Day two was facilitated by Mrs Vera Kamtukule who started by inviting Mrs Winnie Jalasi to
open the session with a word of prayer. She then welcomed all guests and participants present
and later gave an overview of the objectives of the next two days and an outline of the format
to be followed.
The following, were the objectives of the workshop:
Draw lessons and best practices from Malawi cities & other Southern African cities on
settlement upgrading
Draft a concrete way forward after enumerations and mapping of informal settlements
Set out distinct ways through which upgrading project can be implemented
Mrs Kamtukule then introduced participants starting with those from Zambia, Zimbabwe,
Namibia, South Africa and then lastly Malawi. After the introductions, she invited the Chief
Executive for Lilongwe City Council Mr Kelvin M’mangisa to give his opening remarks. In his
remarks, Mr M’mangisa re-stated the main objective of the forum as being to share ideas on all
the activities that we are all implementing. He also recognized the role of donors in
development arguing that due to budgetary constraints, city councils are unable to implement
all their programmes and thus tend to rely on donor support. He particularly singled out the
Melinda Gates Foundation for supporting our cities in development projects with financial
assistance close to US$ 5million.
He added that conflicts inevitable in such projects especially because of varying interests
among stakeholders; and sometimes such conflicts stem from disagreements regarding use of
money and so on. It is therefore important to enforce transparency and accountability in all the
public projects in order to reduce such conflicts and these also form an integral part of effective
project management. He further stressed the need for communities to be in the driving seat for
such projects and actively participating from the design to the implementation phase of the
same. Mr M’mangisa finally assured all foreign delegates of the city’s as well as their personal
security throughout their stay here in Malawi. He stressed that Malawi is a peaceful nation
despite all that had been reported in the past.
2.1 Presentations from Mzuzu, Zomba, Lilongwe and Blantyre City Councils.
Presentations from all cities were combined into one presentation since they are doing similar
things and this was delivered by Mr Costly Chanza, Director of Planning from Blantyre City
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Council. He later gave a second presentation showcasing Blantyre City Slum Upgrading
initiatives.
Titled “Participatory Slum Upgrading Programme (PSUP) in Malawi” by Costly Chanza.
Mr Chanza started by defining the PSUP that it is an accelerated and action-oriented urban
assessment of needs and capacity-building gaps at the city level, whose overall goal is to positively contribute to the Millennium Development Goals and urban poverty reduction. The
programme in Malawi is supported by funds from the European Commission’s European
Development Fund being implemented in over 30 countries in Africa, Caribbean and the Pacific
Countries (ACP Group of States” providing 5 Characteristics of slum dwellers (UN Habitat Global
Report on Slums 2003).
It has often been argued that in Malawi we do not have slums as yet but informal settlements.
Mr Chanza however justified the need for the PSUP because although Malawi has a low
urbanisation level (20%), it has one of the highest urbanisation rates in Africa (5.3%) and that its
urban growth is synonymous with slum growth. Mr Chanza further stated that 67.7% of
Malawi’s urban population live under slum conditions characterised by poor access to basic
services, insufficient living space, insecurity of tenure and social exclusion among others.
In 2008, the Government of Malawi sought assistance for support to slum upgrading in
Malawi’s cities to improve living conditions in line with efforts towards MGD 7 target 11 on
slums. Following this plea, Malawi was included to benefit from the global Participatory Slum
Upgrading Programme for ACP countries financed by the EC through the Intra-ACP fund and
implemented by UN-HABITAT following an EC/ACP/UN-HABITAT agreement of 2005 in support
of urban poverty reduction and this was to be implemented in Lilongwe, Zomba, Mzuzu and
Blantyre. The cities have now produced their urban sector profiles and have since identified
priority actions for each city.
Mr Chanza further outlined achievements of the PSUP this far and outlined other planned and
complimentary activities for phase 2 of the programme and that this forum formed part of
these complimentary activities.
Titled “Slum upgrading initiatives for Blantyre City Council” by Costly Chanza.
The presentation gave an overview of Blantyre as a city in terms of population, basic services,
activities and challenges there of. Using Hindson and McCarthy’s (1994) description of informal
settlements, Mr Chanza argued that they are dense settlements comprising communities
housed in self-constructed shelters under conditions of informal or traditional land tenure. He
explained that the City has 16 informal settlements all characterized by unsafe water sources
and poor sanitation among others. As a way of showcasing lasting solutions to the problems
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that the urban poor face, the Blantyre City Council in 2005 allocated 11.9Ha 118,656m² of land
at Angelo Goveya in Limbe to the Centre for Community Organisation and Development
(CCODE) to construct 465 low cost houses to low income people in Blantyre City. This project is
supported by the Homeless Peoples Federation.
In addition, the council is participating in the Water, Sanitation and Housing Improvement
Project for the Urban Poor in Area 11, South Lunzu. The project is being supported by the
African Development Band (ADB) and its overall goal is to contribute to the improvement of the
living conditions of the urban poor of Blantyre City as well as demonstrate and stimulate
interest in integrated urban development by combining water, sanitation and low income
housing.
Blantyre ISN - Loveness Chimaliro
Loveness Chimatiro explained how the Blantyre ISN works in collaboration with existing
community authorities as well as the city council. She emphasized on the role of exchange
programmes on the overall on profiling process. She added that the ISN plans are yet to be
submitted to City Council for approval.
Mzuzu City ISN by Forward Khwati
Salisbury area was used as a pilot for the slum upgrading project in Mzuzu. He started by giving
a brief background of how the community came about and how it got its name that is similar to
a community in Zimbabwe. He added that Mzuzu University approached Federation and
community members to initiate the slum upgrading project, thereby making the programme
valid to the beneficiaries and other stakeholders.
2.2 Question and Answer Time
South Africa: Are there any conditions attached to the land provided to CCODE by the
City Council.
Answer:
- The land was transferred from Government to Council, and the council transferred it to
CCODE. CCODE and the MHPF gave a condition that land could be transferred to
another person only when loan repayments have been completed. However the
transfers do not occur among the people themselves, the Federation decided who to
allocate the transferred land to.
Question from South Africa:
Has a problem with terminology of ‘Slums’, ‘informal settlement’ and ‘squatters’ as
these tend to take away the legitimacy of the people who reside in those areas
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Answer: Language issue and cultural differences. However, in Malawi ‘informal settlement’ is
the term commonly used for slums. In addition, the word ‘slum’
should also not pose a problem to SDI affiliates who address
themselves as Shack or Slum dwellers all the time.
Question from South Africa
Is the slum upgrading project a five-year project and as a participatory project did it
Incorporate the people in the informal settlement or it used a top-down approach?
- Answer: it’s a five year plan and all programmes and projects were participatory ones
that allowed active engagement of community leaders in identifying challenges and
designing solutions.
Question from Zimbabwe
How Malawi is dealing with political issues in overriding the projects in the informal
Settlements
Answer:
- ISN engages all chiefs and other stakeholders without including the political platform
however the only major problem was making informal settlers understand what
upgrading entails. CCODE’s role is to mediate and facilitate such interactions between
the ISN and existing local leaderships and the City Council
2.3 South Africa Presentation- City of Johannesburg- presented by Thabo Molaba
Thabo started by giving a description of an informal settlement according to South African
standards. It was evident that the challenges thereof are similar to those in Malawi and other
similar areas across the world. He added that the data the city is using is not clear it is outdated
and causes problems when critical decisions ought to be made. Thabo explained the following
as some of the measures/phases the City of Johannesburg has used as a way of improving the
living conditions of people living in Informal settlements:
- Phase one involves the Recognition of informal settlements, this leads to regularization
and formalization of the same. As a result, securities of tenure are enhanced, the
communities become included in city plans and have access to basic services and
mostly, they are recognized as real citizens of the city.
- Phase two is the project design and planning
- Phase three is the implementation
- Phase four is the development of housing
He added that all these phases are implemented in partnership with communities and their
support NGOs. He said communities and NGOs deal with real issues on the ground while cities
drive the city agenda that excludes the poor and usually leads to decisions that affect them
greatly like evictions. Even when communities conduct enumeration exercises, they get better
detailed information than the city. When the ISN came to the city of Johannesburg for a
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meeting, their concept was sold to other departments as well so that they could come on board
as early as possible. The city has had a share of its challenges in supporting the agenda of the
urban poor. One of such problems is that the ISN in the city is perceived as a political
movement (anti-government).
2.4 Second Presentation from South Africa by ISN
Titled “Partnerships that work” presented by Vuyani Mnyango
The presenter started by saying that ISN is there to change the mentality of officials and to help
them understand among other things that what the people want is in-situ upgrading and not
the allocation of land elsewhere that involves shifting of people thereby destroying people’s
socio-economic lives in the process. He then presented two pilot projects on slum upgrading
being implemented in Slovo and Ruimsig. He argued that both these projects were
implemented in partnership with city authorities and other stakeholders like the University. As
a result of such partnerships; they formulated a vision for the development and upgrading of
the same from within and later developed community service maps for upgrading. Some of the
problems faced during implantation of these pilot programmes were that the land is jointly
owned by the city and the province and therefore ownership issues are difficult to decide on.
2.5 Presentation from City of Cape Town by Mohau Melani
The presenter emphasized on the importance of building a platform in dealing with community
issues. He added that it was important that the city authorities should constantly be
represented in community planning meeting to get a deeper understanding of the issues and
offer their technical support. Such meetings can take place at least once a month to discuss
short term of long term projects. He also argued that it is not possible for city authorities to
solve community problems instantly, other problems take time to solve and that mutual
cooperation and investment of time to build the relationship is needed. He added that
sometimes it is hard to get cooperation from other departments within the municipality
especially when they do not understand the community processes fully. Such problems can be
addressed by continuous engagement with all stakeholders. To summarize the Cape Town
presentation, Acting Director for COURC Mrs Siku Nkhoma pointed out that Cape Town is
actually ahead in upgrading programmes and these are not very big but smaller projects. She
also added that such projects are implemented in collaboration with city authorities and that all
projects are identified from the data sourced from enumeration exercises. As of now,
communities in Cape Town are moving away from welfare state to community initiatives in
upgrading projects.
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2.6 Namibia first Presentation by Rticia Lungameni – Federation member
The presenter started by describing Swakopmund informal settlement and gave a bit of a
background to it. Unlike in Malawi and South Africa, enumeration in this area was done by a
town planning consultant. The consultant’s overall goal was to develop a new lay out for the
same for Government approval, since in Namibia, formalization of informal settlements has to
be planned according to framework of the government. Following this procedure, the first
attempt did not materialise because of inadequacy of basic infrastructure that could not be
provided.
Later, community involvement was seen to be lacking and so city authorities started engaging
communities. The communities elected a planning committee that comprises councillors,
community representatives and city officials. The committee meets every two months; and
since its establishment, they have conducted socio-economic surveys and have surveyed
backyard settlers previously ignored by city authorities.
2.7 Namibia second presentation by Mr. Braam Abraham
The presenter was representing the section which plans development initiatives in informal
settlements and this work is guided by the Planning and Development Strategy and is informed
by community needs. There are two public meetings that are held between the council and the
residents represented by councillors. Other meetings are organized in communities called by
the city council and communities express their needs raised at the public meetings. For the
socio-economic surveys, the city used to have its own tool, but now the tool was revised to
combine with the forms the federation was using for their enumeration exercises. The
combined survey was piloted and completed and it was interesting to see that for the first time,
community members conducted the survey other than the use of University students.
2.8 Question and Answer Time
A member of the Malawi ISN wanted to know why it took two months for 24
enumerators to enumerate 1523 households when it took two and a half months for 40
enumerators in Malawi to enumerate 18,000 households.
Answer from Namibia
- Seems Malawi Federation and ISN have a lot of experience hence the reason Malawi
processes moved smoothly. However in Namibia it must be emphasised that this was a
new project and that they were still at a stage of fostering partnerships with relevant
authorities. All these factors made the enumeration process longer than anticipated. It
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must also be noted that the population of Namibia as a nation is still at 2 Million;
therefore communities do not deal with huge numbers of households in such initiatives.
- In addition, in DRC, the federation there did not have enough members and this also
affected the duration of the exercise. Further, enumerators failed to use existing
community structures and were seen to be enumerating their own members only
Question to South Africa
The speaker wanted to know what RSA is doing to handle the problem of gentrification,
a process that sees rich people settling on a land meant for the poor like Area 36 in
Lilongwe.
Answer:
- Guidelines of the housing project state that people should not sell their houses but
take them back to government fro re-allocation. This is however very difficult to
monitor, but the city tries its best.
How will you ensure that old plans e.g. those that encourage evictions, should no longer
be used to guide slum upgrading projects?
Answer:
- In RSA, evictions are no longer being discussed. The country has now moved towards
in-situ upgrading
Question to Namibia
How are they dealing with issues of illegal backyard and buildings as regards
development control?
Answer:
- Conducted a socio-economic survey on backyard shacks with assistance of communities,
plans are under way to find a new area onto which these people will be relocated since
at present, their land lords penalize them with bills. The back yard settlers indicated that
they will be ready to move when time comes
- This is also one of the Urbanisation challenges; where people moving to urban areas
without considering accommodation but looking for employment first, hence the
backyard structures/shacks
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Question to South Africa
South Africa is using regulations from United Nations and other similar international
protocols dressing housing challenges, what about the NGOs that do not follow those
standards and protocols, considering the fact that a poor person cannot afford an
internationally acceptable structure due to costs implications?
Answer:
- The South African President is mandated to submit an annual report to the UN and it is a
requirement that the country must indicate therein what they are doing in improving
the lives of slum dwellers. This does not in any way mean that poor people are required
to construct high standard structures that cost a lot of money.
- Realizing that community dynamics are many and diverse, there is also a Redbook of
norms and standards that is used as a manual for providing basic standards and services.
For example in the Redbook it is indicated that for every 4000 houses there is a need for
all basic needs to be provided.
- Regularizations- are a basic standard style that has been put in place to enforce on the
standardization of houses that are to be built in the slum upgrading projects.
- On the issues of poor people moving away from the newly upgraded areas there are
regulations in place that indicate that a person must move out of the house after 7 years
and then hand over the same to city authorities
2.9 Zimbabwe ISN- Federation Presentation from Ms Chilemba (Federation) the
Municipality of Chinhoyi and Dialogue on Shelter
The presentation from Zimbabwe started with a video clip showcasing participatory slum
upgrading programmes in Zimbabwe. The process starts with enumeration exercises before
construction of the houses. The highlight of this video was that after negotiations and
discussions, the municipality eventually allowed the construction and eventual use of ecosan
toilets for the Federation. The MHPF was therefore instrumental in supporting their Zimbabwe
counter parts in this regard. No contractor was hired for construction works; all work was done
by the Zimbabwean Federation. In addition, boreholes were constructed and land was given for
bricks (In Zimbabwe, people are not allowed to mould bricks on their own, there are companies
who make these bricks and people are mandated to buy from the same).
The representative from Chinhoyi Municipality acknowledged that as a municipality, they have
learnt a lot from the Federation. This was done through exchange visits facilitated by the
Federation to Kariba. This exchanged made the council to understand the Federation process
which led to land allocation (250 stands, now occupied), lay out plans and cadastral surveys. It
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was decided that incremental approach to development would work for the poor rather than
the convectional approach that required all services to be present in an area before
construction actually begins. The idea behind this change of mind was, ‘Cater for them before
they cater for themselves’.
Patience Mudimu, a representative from Dialogue on Shelter thanked the Federation in Malawi
and CCODE for time invested in planning and negotiations that has led to this forum. Malawi is
no longer talking, it has now taken necessary steps to action and Zimbabwe is looking forward
for continual support from the Federation in Malawi. She added that as an NGO, Dialogue on
Shelter first supported the Federation to construct conventional houses. They soon realized
that they were making little or no impact at all; as this would entail the use of contractors and
servicing of land prior to construction as stated earlier. Nowadays however, they are using
green field development, all this work is done by the Federation thus increasing the impact and
the number of beneficiaries. The major lesson that Dialogue on shelter has learnt from this
experience is that ‘slum upgrading has to be a choice, it just cannot happen’. Further, you
have to think bigger than the households; you have to look at the entire neighbourhood,
community and city. However, this process starts very small initially, but has a bigger impact in
the long run.
Dialogue on Shelter has had some challenges in their operation. The following are some of the
Challenges faced:
- Policy guidelines from Central Government is lacking and it is not clear where they
stand
- Even though slums were demolished during operation Murambatsina, they are now
coming back and spreading wider geographically
- There is no protocol on how to develop slums and there is a growing fear that this
may lead to evictions
- The issue of slum upgrading affordability is also critical, if not carefully considered, it
can lead to exclusion of the poor
- Partnerships with City authorities take time and resources to build; but it is not clear
how we can develop such partnerships to a level where the investment actually goes
far
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2.10 Zambia Presentation by Mr. Mundashi Mwango
Zambia is also involved in City wide slum upgrading programmes. The following is the approach
they are using:
- Mobilisation and sensitisation
- Information gathering sanitation, housing needs assessment
- Work plan formulation with community
- Implementation with community
Some of the challenges faced by the Zambia Federation are:
- No binding policies on upgrading
- Have top-down approach.
Case Study 1
Chawama Project 2008
Improved Sanitation (Toilets)
House Model: Built as a result of information gathering and what the beneficiary
wanted
Case Study 2
Kalundu Viwe 2011
Enumeration was done in 2011
Area had a total Population of 2494 and had 534 households
Case Study 3
George Compound
This was an informal settlement
60 houses to be improved on a pilot basis
Zambians will want to learn from Malawians on how they have done the clustering
As an income generation activity, the Zambia Federation constructed a Resource Centre. The
centre is used for meetings, as well as Fund raising activities to support the slum upgrading
programme.
2.11 Group Discussions- based on countries represented
After all the presentations, countries went into group discussions for about 20 minutes to
discuss the concept of slum upgrading and the roles of Community, local authorities as well as
NGOs in the upgrading process.
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2.12 Zimbabwe Group Presentation
Definition: Slum is a place that has been inhabited by people without approval of Local
planning Authority on an unplanned basis as such it lacks basic infrastructure like water and
sanitation, security of tenure, lack of social infrastructure e.g. Schools, Health facilities e.t.c.
Slum Upgrading
It is a process where you gradually improve the living conditions of a slum settlement by the
provision of lacking infrastructure without moving people or minus disruption of existing
settlements.
Key Stakeholders
Community/Slum Dwellers.
Local Authority and Government Agencies and Politicians.
Support NGOs, Universities, Churches
Develop a platform of agreement with all key players required.
Roles
Communities are the affected and the beneficiaries as such they are the key
stakeholders and should lead the mobilisation of the community, their needs,
information collection.
To come up with a Memorandum of Understanding (M.O.U) detailing the roles of each
stakeholder and the type of structure to be used.
2.13 Namibia Group Presentation
Upgrading
Strategy/Process
Step by step; Addressing gaps
Formulisation-end result
Processes
Initial recognition by City Authorities
Addressing Priorities
Role of the Community
Own process plus organise themselves
Active participation, community contribution (savings), mobilisation and provision of
labour
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Community to influence national policy
Local Authority Partnership Building
Engage in community where needed interactions identified
Raise consciousness but not decide for the community; facilitate information collection
and decision making
2.14 Malawi Group Presentations
Blantyre Upgrading
Needs the Following:
Water
Toilets
Houses
Communities
Choosing smaller developments in a cluster
Starting and implementing saving schemes
ISN Collecting funds for development
Role
Development in clusters
Calling for meetings
Implementing the needs of clusters
2.15 Lilongwe Group Presentation
Definition of Upgrading: Achieving the following
Clean Water
Good Houses
Good toilets
Tarmac roads
Role of the community
Starting and implementing cluster funds
Choosing the kind of development they want to see achieved
ISN helping with cluster processes
2.16 Mzuzu Group Presentation
Slum Upgrading: Developing areas in which people have not been evicted for example:
Building Gutters
Roads
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Toilets
Water
Responsibilities of the Community
Determining what is needed to develop the community
The residents of the community should participate in things like
Holding Talks
Holding researches
Numbering and Mapping (questionnaires)
with the City Council on matters of development
Roles of the City Council
Monitoring the community
Meeting with community committee in regular intervals
Respecting the beneficiaries
Taking into account and understanding the community’s plans
Monitoring clusters’ plans involving minor development.
2.17 Closing Remarks by Mphatso Njunga
Ms Njunga argued that Slum problem is not unique to Malawi as per the country presentations
at this forum. The problems that the urban poor face are similar across Africa and even beyond.
She isolated three major issues that should be considered when initiating slum upgrading
programmes:
- Together we can make it, all stakeholders should work together to fulfil the objectives of
these projects.
- Partnership should be designed with clear responsibilities and functions and using a
bottom-up approach
- Group discussions are important and timely and consistent interactions with all
stakeholders are important. It is important that people should change the perception
that people from the community are impatient; rather, authorities should invest more
time to understand their needs.
She added that the forum has provided opportunities for learning for all participants. The
presentations from Chinsapo and Mtandire on the current situation of their settlements she
said, and what needs to be done therein; maps out the right path to take for slum dwellers. It
shows that communities are driving the change process and it is the responsibility of city
officials to support such this processes.
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3.0 Day 3: Cities Forum, Final day
The day started with a word of prayer from Winnie Jalasi. Mrs Vera Kamtukule the facilitator
then invited Mr Jack Makau, Shack Dwellers International representative to give his opening
remarks as well as introduce the Guest speaker from Pakistan Mr Arif Hasan, to participants. In
his remarks, Mr Makau stated that slum upgrading/ upgrading of informal settlements, echoes
within a broader framework of the national slum upgrading programmes, which represents
government commitment towards attaining Cities without Slums and achieving the Millennium
Development Goals (particularly goal number 7 sub section 11). Within this National Slum
Upgrading programme therefore, governments must intend to provide resources to support
upgrading initiatives and funding.
He added that, in South Africa, the Government is currently finalising the review of the National
Housing Policy and its implementation strategy. Among other things, the policy is cognisant of
the fact that housing problems cannot be solved without the involvement of the communities.
He further argued that South Africans have a common saying which states “nothing for us
without us’ and that “the voice of the people is the voice of God”, and God must be the guide of
us all throughout the path we have chosen to take. It is a path without a dead end. He ended by
saying that he hoped that this forum will be used as a beginning to a process not as an end in
itself.
Mr Arif Hasan was expected to make three presentations tackling the following topics:
- The role of communities in city wide planning
- The role of local authorities and government in city wide planning
- The role of the academia regarding planning beyond books and conference papers.
Mr Hasan however, chose to combine all three topics into one long presentation and thereafter
participants asked various questions that went up the end of the Malawi Cities Forum on city
wide slum upgrading. Mr Hasan started by thanking the organizers of the forum for inviting him
to Malawi and added that he was not sure whether he was the lucky one or the participants
were lucky to have a meeting that included all necessary sectors of people into one room. He
added that in Pakistan, this kind of achievement is hard to come by.
It should be noted at this point that Mr Hasan used the Orangi Pilot project in the city of Karachi
in Pakistan as his case study. The city of Karachi in brief according to 2006 statistics has a
population of 8, 540,000 against 1,200,000 households and about 50.5% of this population live
below the poverty line. There has been a significant increasing in housing costs between 1991-
2007 ranging from US$ 8.8 to US$67 (for a semi permanent house). From 1999 to 2007, the city
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has seen a lot of evictions by the government due to development projects and badly planned
urban renewals. The evictions have resulted into reduction of income for poor people
particularly women as well as loss of investment in the structures among other things. 75% of
people on Karachi work in the informal sector.
The Orangi pilot project started with a participatory research which revealed that sanitation
was the major problem in the area. The area was first divided into lanes (clusters) so that
development could be effected on a small scale basis and managed easily. In the end, about
105, 103 households constructed their sanitation systems with a total investment of US$2
Million against a US$10 Million which the local authorities would have invested if they had
done the job themselves. The improved sanitation system significantly reduced infant mortality,
cases of water borne diseases and created jobs for the community among other achievements.
The success of this programme also resulted into government requesting OPP to design a
sanitation policy for the nation. The scale up of the project was achieved through creation of
partnerships between the communities and central and local government as well as with the
academia.
The following is a summary of his presentations and this will be followed by varying questions
that were asked by participants after Mr Hasan’s presentations. The summary has been divided
into the three sessions that he was expected to deliver on:
3.1 The role of community in city wide planning
Mr Hasan emphasized the fact that in the much talked about Public Private Partnerships (PPP),
if the public is weak, then PPP's will not work effectively. Thus it is very important that
communities take centre stage of the development agenda of their communities. Community
engagement in Pakistan is done in several ways. This consists of training young persons and
other community leaders in surveying, documentation, designing, estimation, on-site
Supervision and community mobilisation. So far 42 persons have been trained and 18 are under
training. As a result of this programme 337 Karachi communities (out of 539) have been
surveyed and mapped along with their physical and social infrastructure. 52 of 63 natural drains
carrying 80% of Karachi’s sewage have been documented along with their catchment areas.
Some of the multiplier effects of this kind of community involvement are that: this has resulted
into alternative sewage plan for Karachi which needs no foreign loans except for treatment
plants, there has been a change in the ADB sewage plan for Orangi, there has been cancellation
of ADB loans for Korangi Waste Water Management Programme, the formation of the technical
training resource centre, partnership development between the communities and city
government and last but not least, the much needed advisory support to city government and
provincial Planning and Development Department.
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Other roles and lessons for communities according to Mr Hasan are:
- Survey, document and disseminate what already exists and build on it
- Work with support NGOs like CCODE, Dialogue on Shelter to support local leaders on
social mobilization taking into consideration cultural aspects of the communities
- Develop conceptual plans
- Decentralize and simplify functions and technologies so that people can afford them
- Identify best relationships between needs, resources, standards with an understanding
that these are all dynamic
- Manage local social organizations like saving schemes backed by knowledge; build a
critical mass of people
- Avoid aggressive marketing and public relations especially in the media, good work
speaks for itself
- Monitor communications, promote transparency and accountability
- Avoid aiming for quick results, start with smaller projects and take your time
- Once projects have been designed and decided upon, be ready to handle psychological,
social, economic as well as technical barriers that come into play; never compromise on
decisions made
3.2 Role of Local Authorities and Government in citywide planning
As stated earlier, partnership development between communities and the local authorities is
essential in the implementation of slum upgrading programmes. However, it should be noted
that when dealing with local authorities, it is best to deal with those that are at middle level
management rather than senior or top officials to reduce on bureaucracy that usually stalls
development initiatives. Mr Hasan mentioned the following as some of the major roles for the
local and central government in slum upgrading:
- Design city plans from the view point of communities, this entails constant engagement
with the same and may at times result into lowering of standards to suit people’s
affordability
- Allow communities to experiment and learn from their own mistakes
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- Planning has to respect the ecology and the natural environment of the area in which
the city is located.
- Land use has to be determined on the basis of social and environmental considerations
and not on the basis of land value (or potential land value) alone.
- Planning must give priority to the needs of the majority population which in the case of
Pakistan belongs to the lower income or lower middle income classes.
- Planning has to respect the tangible and intangible cultural heritage of human
settlements and of the communities living in them.
3.3 Role of the academia regarding planning beyond books and conference papers
In Pakistan, as it is elsewhere in the world including Malawi, architects, planners, surveyors are
taught how to design, but they are not taught how they can impart this knowledge to other
people especially the group that has never been to school. However, these people have a
mandate to give back to society. Further, as they graduate from college, they leave with an
illusion that they will be designing big building and expensive apartments for rich people.
Reality on the ground states that this will only be but a dream to some of these learned people.
At the same time, the gap that they create especially on the need to provide technical expertise
to communities willing to develop their communities is usually filled by social experts from
NGOs like CCODE. This means therefore, our education system has to change to reflect this
reality on the ground. Some of the roles of academic institutions include:
- Change of their education system to engage students with communities as part of their
training programme
- Ensure that their education is benefitting the general public and that they are
accountable to the people; lawyers and doctors take oaths prior to their work, why
shouldn’t planners, surveyors and architects do the same thing?
- Academic institutions to be a knowledge centers for alternatives that can work for the
poor
- Provision of technical supervision to upgrading programmes in communities in liaison
with support organizations like NGOs as well as local authorities
- Design affordable and acceptable technologies
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3.4 Question and Answer Time
How did you do the sanitation project? Did people pay faithfully; was the city involved, did
it require the shifting of people to another area?
How did you ensure that the information collected by the poor is actually used by
authorities and informs their decision making?
Is it possible to start using results of profiling and enumerations, before they are endorsed
by city authorities/
Answers:
- We never compromised on the projects. It was decided people will have to pay, a
specific amount was decided on, and initially it was protested against, but eventually
people paid. The development took place right inside the lanes and there was no
shifting of people. City officials and OPP provided the needed technical expertise and
supervision
- We were lucky that at the time of the project, we had a weak government. All
information collected by the poor was used because the 1978 law regularized
settlements and this eventually became the practice and changed the relationship
between communities and their government. For us, we started using our information
almost immediately. However, confidence in the validity of your own information comes
with scale.
Could you please explain the component sharing aspect and how it works
How can NGOs move from advocacy rights based to cooperate action
Answers:
- In component sharing, various actors do their part and they do not share costs
necessarily in that regard. For example, in a sanitation project, the neighbourhood will
provide the land, the city will provide the trunks and treatment plants, the people will
collect the garbage to the pick up points
- There has to be a buffer between the elected and the people e.g. institutions of
participatory democracy otherwise there is usually a delink between these two. This is
the role that NGOs play; they help communities understand, learn and teach the same
to others, thus moving from advocacy to complete action.
Describe the development initiatives at lane level
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What influenced government to enact the regularization law in 1978 and what role did
the community play in this regard
Do you have a law in Pakistan, that allows people to question why the development
they demanded from their city is not coming
Answers:
- Development from lane (cluster level) is one of the many models in component sharing.
First if the community lays the sewer, then the NGO and/or the city come in with
technical expertise. This was done in one lane, and soon more lanes came on board and
later it was the entire community. The community negotiated, a new leadership sprung
up from the lanes, this process however took about 5-6 years
- The lane leadership is much better in such development because whenever a local
leader contested and won a political election, they became useless because they soon
became part of the whole corrupt system that people detested, and all lane leaders
challenged this process using three tool:
They took possession of their neighbourhood
They collected the money themselves and used it for their own priorities
rather than the political leaders
Acquired technical skills and confidence to question the system and
eventually this resulted into the authorities accepting their work and
agreeing to supervise the same
- There is no law in Pakistan that follows that ensures the demands of the people are met,
however, the people can still demand if they are organized e.g. through going to press
clubs to block traffic and this usually works and authorities listen, this can probably not
work in many parts of Africa
In terms of operation and maintenance groups are there any people in communities
that make a living out of these?
Do authorities enforce operational standards
How can we ensure that government officials are accountable to the people
What did people in Pakistan do to ensure that plans of the poor are brought to the
attention of authorities?
36
Answers:
- Based on the component sharing model again, there are some lanes that have formed
groups responsible for the maintenance of the structures because local level
maintenance is much better and quicker, but mostly it is crisis management. However
there are some entrepreneurs who make a living out of it e.g. the garbage collectors
- These communities at first were largely full of working class people. But now, they have
transformed into middle aged entrepreneurs most of whom are also working in the
formal sector. This means that when you enter the community, you are met by young
people. This change is important for two reasons:
The settlements are moving towards becoming the city’s
middle class and thus will gain political power
This has created a rift between the settlements and the ‘real’
middleclass people
- On ensuring that government officials are accountable, in Pakistan we tried so hard, and
at one time we were succeeding but soon failed, then we decided to do the following:
Every statement that an official makes should be exhibited
There should be a steering committee that must drive such
issues formally and that government must allocate at least one
official into the committee who will be in charge of the
projects with his name appearing on every correspondence
There must be a scrutiny of accounts to promote transparency
however while this was in the pipeline, local government
elections came, mayors took over and this whole process was
halted. Now there are plans to get this process back on track.
In Pakistan it should be noted, most of the community
development occurred prior to decentralization after which
mayors were given all powers and things have since changed
What criteria is used to allocate loans to people and on the social side, how did you
ensure that the power was reverted back to the people
Has the Karachi project been replicated
37
What strategies were used to influence policy and how did you deal with the hard core
technicalities of the projects
How did you deal with loan defaulters
Answers:
- There is a micro-credit facility mainly for the rural areas. Urban loans are for existing
businesses meant to expand operations of the same or bringing groups together to
improve productivity. Other bigger loans are for establishment of schools,
manufacturing of slabs, pre cast man holes and so on. There are also housing loans for
initiation of housing projects and all these loans are fully repaid usually
- There is a Pakistan Property Alleviation Fund, which is like a biggest fund in Asia and the
state has invested a lot in the same. The advantage of this fund are the following:
It reduces dependency of CBOs and NGOs on external funding
It does not require much paper work
You can communicate in local language when making transactions
People feel they are borrowing their own money
- This is a community process, it is not about reverting the power back to communities, it
is about changing the focus of officials to look at issues from the community’s
perspective without necessarily neglecting the global phenomena
- We were able to influence policy in that the communities had a deeper understanding
of their needs, designed a detailed plan of what they wanted, and this was presented to
planners with a proposition on the way forward and this resulted into a larger political
impact
- Replication of projects is about replicating people; the influence of the Karachi project
has been enormous due to the scale of the project itself
- There were no specific strategies used to influence policy what made the whole
difference was:
Populace bias
Ability to provide affordable technologies
Support of an informed public
38
Constant touch with government
Make the project part of the global debate on development
Working with middle level bureaucrats
- Loan defaulters are always there, however, 98% of the people do repay their loans. The
other 2% comprises of crooks, bad business people and the dead. In this regard, a
successful loan programme has to be arranged in such a way that you do not give
money to the people falling in the 2% mark. Thus you give to those with a guarantee and
a good record of loan repayment. Other people give post dated cheques, in that way
they tie themselves to ensuring that their accounts actually do have funds when time
for repayment comes.
3.5 Closing Remarks by Mrs Ivy Luhanga, PS, Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban
Management
After the question and answer time, there was a break from refreshments after which the
Principal secretary for Land and Housing Mrs Ivy Luhanga, came in to officially close the forum
as well as launch the Urban Profiles from the four cities of Malawi. She was introduced by the
Acting Director for CCODE, Mrs Cynthia Phiri.
In her remarks, Mrs Luhanga said that she felt greatly honoured to present the closing remarks
for the Malawi Cities Forum on City Wide Slum Upgrading under the theme: Building bridges:
Communities working with Government in City Wide Planning and Development. She
emphasized the fact that the Government of Malawi had placed the reduction of poverty at the
centre of its activities as a nation as stipulated in the Malawi Growth and Development Strategy
(MGDS II) and that the objectives therein cannot be achieved by government alone and that a
holistic approach in its implementation is required. She added that this entails bringing on
board all sectors together be it informal or formal. In this regard, Government acknowledges
the contribution of cities and urban communities to the overall economic growth of this
country.
Mrs Luhanga further stated that achieving significant changes in the lives of the poor must and
should require their active participation. In this regard, Government was well pleased with the
proposed participatory slum upgrading programme that will see communities entering into
meaningful partnerships to design city wide planning and development initiatives. On behalf of
the Government of Malawi, through my Ministry, Mrs Luhanga to pledged government’s
support towards to the Local Authorities as well as to the communities and the NGOs that
support them on this programme that will significantly change the look of our cities and several
other cities across the Southern Africa.
39
She also recognized the contribution of the Malawi Homeless People’s Federation and CCODE
in complementing Government’s efforts on improving the living conditions of the poor in the
country through low cost housing projects as well as sanitation programmes that they run.
On the launch of the Urban Profiles, Mrs Luhanga argued that these urban profiles make one
part of the Participatory Slum Upgrading Programme (PSUP) in Malawi aimed at accelerating an
action oriented urban assessment of needs and capacity gaps at city level. She thanked the ACP,
UN Habitat and the EU who had contributed in several ways to come up with these profiles. She
also recognized the role of the cities themselves, communities and NGOs in this work and
thanked them for a job well done. After these remarks, she officially launched the profiles and
handed over to a representative from the Ministry of Local Government and Rural
Development copies of the same with a word of advise that the contents thereof had to be
used to the last detail.
After these remarks, the facilitator Mrs Kamtukule, thanked all the participants for their
contributions and wished them a safe journey back home. Mrs Winnie Jalasi closed the forum
with a word of prayer.
3.6 Conclusion
As stated earlier, the forum aimed at achieving the following objectives:
Draw lessons and best practices from Malawi cities & other Southern African cities on
settlement upgrading
Draft a concrete way forward after enumerations and mapping of informal settlements
Set out distinct ways through which upgrading project can be implemented
All the above mentioned objectives were adequately achieved in the forum. The communities
together with their local authorities also mapped the way forward on how they will use the
lessons that they have learnt from the forum. The high light of the forum was the experiences
articulated from the Pakistan case study where the roles of communities, planners and the
academia were clearly articulated. It was clear that community development while focusing on
the entire community should start initiatives at lane/cluster level as this is easy to manage; it is
cheap and can be used as a basis for negotiations with city officials. Local authorities and the
academia also need to engage actively with communities through monthly meetings or as often
as it can be required so that they can share experiences and work together to plan and develop
their cities better.
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Appendix 1
List of participants
NAME ORGANISATION DESIGNATION
1 Braam Harris Namibia Housing Action Group Town Planner
2 Forward Khuwati Salisbury Line Mzuzu V.H/ Chief
3 Alice Maliza Mzuzu Federation R. Leader
4 Sydney D. Tese Mzuzu Community Chiwinga Community Chair
5 Esther Manganyera Blantyre City Council profile
6 Ruth Gwaza Blantyre City Council Profile
7 Dorothy Phiri MHPF member
8 Noel Nazombe Blantyre City Council V. Headman
9 Lucy Aleka MHPF member
10 Bertha kapangama MHPF LL
11 Charyt Thole MHPF member
12 Dorothy Yassin MHPF Regional Leader
13 Esnat William MHPF LL R. Leader
14 Richard Omanya DIG Nairobi
15 Cecilia Sabao Blantyre City Profile
16 Ruth Kachingwe Blantyre City V. Headman
17 Noel F. Nazombe Blantyre City V. Headman
18 Enock Brown MHPF Auditor
19 Loveness Chimaliro Blantyre City Profile
20 Fainess Ngawa MHPF Regional Leader
21 Ethel Solomoni MHPF LL R. Leader
22 Beatrice Yohane MHPF National Leader
23 Gift Chitsamvu MHPF LL
24 Mary Matumba MHPF Regional Leader
25 Modesta kaphala MHPF Regional Leader
26 Rabecca Kangulu MHPF Lilongwe
27 Gabrielo Josaya C.D.C Lilongwe
28 Zilire Lika CCODE Project Officer
29 Cynthia Phiri CCODE Director
30 Moses Padzala CCODE Officer
31 Dr E.J Chikwenda UNIMA Dean of Faculty
32 Grace Gunya Lilongwe City Council MTE
33 Hillary Kamela Lilongwe City Council Officer
34 Peter Schramm CCODE Techn. Advisor
35 Hilda Kabongwe Chinhoyi Municipality Town Planner
41
36 Timothy Maregere Chinhoyi Municipality Director Housing
37 Patience Mudimu Dialogue on Shelter program Director
38 Sekai Chiremba ZIHDPEE National Cordinator
39 Masauko Namaona MHPF Regional Leader
40 S.G.V.H. Chigoneka Mtandire Chief
41 T.A Malili Chinsapo T.A
42 Lackson Phiri MHPF National Leader
43 Alina Mofokog FEDUP Saving finance
44 Mohauji Melam ISN JHB-SA
45 Thabo Karabo Molaba City of JHB SA Assistant Director
46 Vuyani Mnyango ISN-G-RSA Facilitator
47 Mphatso Njunga Federation National Leaders
48 Sarah Kalenjeka MHPF
49 Vera Tambala CCODE Facilitator
50 Gersron G. Goseb SDF Clip Facilitator
51 Rtisia Lungameni Windhoek Federation
52 Mike Mipinge Swaliog Town Official
53 Chifunda Dalireni CICOD Wash Facility
54 N.N. Salomon City of Swakopmud L.A. Councilor
55 M.T. Ashipala City of Windhoek project co-odinator
56 J Korrubel Polytechnic NAM Lecturer
57 Jack makau SDI Documentation
58 Maz Manda Mzuzu/ CCODE
59 Sophos Sophianos GIZ, Mzuzu Planning Adviser
60 Doveley Mupela PPHPZ Houssing Coodinator
61 Muhdashi A. Mwango Copperbelt University H.O.D Architecture
62 Joseph Makadani Zulu Lusaka City Council H.O.D. Planing
63 Magone Mwale ZHPPF Technical
64 Tamara Phiri ZHPPF Technical
65 Tabbie Mnolo CCODE Program Manager
66 Joel Dzutse CCODE T.O
67 Samuel Muhoni LCC-ISN Livelihood Officer
68 Margin Banda Senti Community Leader
69 Tonny Goliat Mtandire Secretary
70 Agness Nakutepa Mtandire ISN Member
71 Cathreen Mthawanji MHPF National Auditor
72 Jean Moyo MHPF National Leader
42
73 Manesi Khunda MHPF National Auditor
74 Magret Kagunda CCODE Officer
75 Anita Pasadi MHPF National Leader
76 Victoria Chawaka MHPF National Auditor
77 Winnie Jalasi MHPF National Leader
78 Dickson Kamwendo MHPF D1
79 Anescazio Soko MHPF N.I
80 Stuwart Phiri Kasungu Rind
81 Walter Fienn CORC SA/ SDI
82 Linda Sankhulani Bunda College Research Officer
83 U.B.G Mughogho Polytechnic Lecturer
84 Andy Bolnick Ilehayalami/CORC NAO
85 Narcy Oderboard AAPS/UCT Accademic
86 Tonex Magomelo Mtandire ISN
87 V.H. Bwemba Chief Chief
88 V.H. Chimphangu Chinsapo ISN ISN
89 V.H. Chinsapo ISN Chief
90 A.K Chirambo Mzuzu City Council Director of Planning
91 Arif Hasan Facilitator OPP