Africa-Press – Namibia. THE Construction Industries Federation of Namibia (CIF) has raised concerns over new obstacles to the speedy delivery of land and housing in Windhoek.
CIF general manager Bärbel Kirchner says the City of Windhoek’s new in-house project specifications for contractors are to be applied to all new infrastructure projects in Windhoek, and the increased costs caused by unwarranted delays ultimately impact the cost of every stage of a building project and also escalate the end-user price.
“Major changes include unrealistically high-quality assessments, with requirements well beyond the relevant publicly known, well-established and generally enforced standards (SANS and SABS),” she says.
“The interest of stakeholders in the construction industry is indeed very much aligned with the leadership of the City of Windhoek, who intend to prioritise land and housing delivery in Windhoek,” Kirchner says.
Kirchner also notes that the new specifications undermine efforts to ensure swift land delivery and are in direct contrast to the announcement by the new mayor, Sade Gawanas, who indicated that land delivery will be one of the city’s highest priorities in the near future.
“While the need for land servicing and housing in the capital city is exceptionally high, the demand cannot be optimally met unlike in other cities and towns in Namibia, where well-established and reliable standards are used,” Kirchner says.
City of Windhoek spokesperson Harold Akwenye told The Namibian that a survey was conducted on the new building regulations, and stakeholders from the construction industry were consulted.
“We made sure that each and every individual or house buyer was included in the survey and it won’t increase the price heavily, especially for those who can’t afford houses,” he says.
Akwenye adds that the whole idea of the new building regulations is to make sure that people don’t take chances, not to increase costs. “These are people that build houses without proper inspection. That’s what it boils down to, it’s not about making the price higher, it’s about tighter regulations,” says Akwenye.
He adds that there are opportunists who use loopholes to construct substandard houses and buildings, which the city is clamping down on. “You find houses cracking. It’s only the end user who falls into that trap where they have to come up with more money at the end of the day because the builder runs away. You paid and your house is cracking. Those are the things we’re trying to cut out,” he says.
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