WALVIS BAY - The Association of Local Authorities in Namibia’s president Samuel !Oë-Amseb says the government should empower regions so that they can employ town planners and engineers to render services to local authorities.

!Oë-Amseb was speaking at the three-day land conference underway in Walvis Bay that is being attended by various mayors, regional and local authority councillors and municipal officials.

The aim is to bring local authorities, stakeholders and investors together to assess progress on fast-tracking and scaling land and housing delivery.

!Oë-Amseb said way too much money is being channelled to consultants by local authorities, and this hampers service delivery.

“Local authorities are required to appoint consultants for all money that is channelled through to capital projects. Those consultants consume a lot of money that could have been channelled to other housing and land servicing projects,” he stated.

Making an example of Outjo, he said a big chunk of their budget goes to consultants, leaving them with little money to carry out projects.

Smaller councils are experiencing this challenge as they are also not equipped to have in-house town planners, and make use of consultants.

“On that basis, regional councils should be empowered to appoint qualified town planners and engineers so that local authorities in that specific region can source their services directly from regional councils. This way, they will only be liable to pay the travel allowances and fuel costs of such employees,” he continued.

Also speaking at the opening was minister of urban development Erastus Uutoni, who echoed similar sentiments that the cost of land, surveying, engineering and infrastructure services are indeed some of the challenges that hamper the delivery of serviced land.

There is indeed a mismatch between the supply and demand for affordable housing, especially for the poor and low-income-earners.

“However, there are a lot of opportunities, which we need to capitalise on.

Most of the local authorities have abundant unserviced land, and there is continued political commitment and budgetary allocations by the central government in support of development programmes that are being implemented at regional and local levels,” Uutoni said.

- edeklerk@nepc.com.na