By Regina Simasiku
WINDHOEK – Land delivery will be one of the main focus areas for Ongwediva Town Council this year, council spokesperson Andreas Uutoni says.
Last Friday, Uutoni said the council would streamline its operations to enhance service delivery to meet increasing demand for improved services.
The council strongly believes that if the issue of land is addressed, the rest would automatically follow. “The rehabilitation of our oxidation ponds is also our number one priority in order to cater for the increase in investment in household, businesses and industries,” said Uutoni.
He said the town council would work with the community and investors in an effort to enhance effective and efficient service delivery.
Uutoni highlighted some of the council’s challenges in 2014, a year that was characterised by an increased demand for improved service delivery and land allocation.
“Residents no longer want to hear the word ‘wait’ for services or land allocations. We have observed an increase in economic activities as a result of the opening of the two major shopping malls in the region, the Oshana Regional Mall and Maroela Mall,” said Uutoni.
He added that the rise in demand for serviced land is because of an increase in the rate of urbanisation of the town, as well as increased business investment, which in turn has attracted job seekers against the backdrop of limited available serviced land.
The council is also limited in its quest to service land because of insufficient finances to compensate households from whom the council is buying land. Households own the land for cultivation and have to give it up to the town council as the town boundaries widen to include rural areas previously out of the town boundaries.
Uutoni, however, noted that last year the town council made major inroads in the provision of services such as water, sewer connections and electricity to low-income areas.
“We have observed increased registration in land ownership, especially in the extensions which were in existence before proclamation of Ongwediva as a town when council offered to purchase residents’ land at a subsidised price of N$5.50 per square metre,” he added.
He said the council also managed to lay the foundations for mass land delivery to the residents that will continue in 2015.
The council has successfully compensated and relocated 150 households from flood-prone areas especially Extension 17 to the higher land at Oshiko extension.
“In terms of effective and efficient service delivery, we have drastically reduced water interruption around town,” said Uutoni.