Africa-Press – Zambia. A month ago when news broke that Provident House in Chipata , fondly known as NAPSA Building was being sold, the colleagues i was with on that day argued that the move to sale is bad. It was said that at this point its wrog for government through NAPSA to start selling properties.
I had an independent look at it. I asked a question to say at this point do we know how much this Buildings makes in rentals? Do we know its operating cost? Do we know the market value of the asset? We didnt have the answers but what was evident is that rental rates at provident house were very low.
The answer to these 3 questions will tell you that NAPSA in not getting best value right now from this property. I jokingly said it could even make more money as a boarding house than how it is currently used.
Sometime before last year, I past through a friend office right there. I asked him “So pano rent ni Zingati? Ati about K550? I said wow really?
I may argue that K16m seats between fair and low, therefore the central government could have saved this sale. As the City grows there are alot of services which can be rendered here to make this property sustainable and profitable.
A week ago i received guests at The KWASU Apartments who came through because their sibling was unwell and they needed to urgently do a CT Scan, unfortunately they informed me that this could only be done in Mambwe because the service was not available at Central Hospital.
To me 16m seats nowhere near the Ministry of Health Budget. They can easily transform this into a Specialized Hospital servicing complex illness such as Cancer within the province.
It being closer to Central Hospital a school for Doctors like our friends in Kitwe and Ndola could have easily being brought here so that our City status is cemented.
On one end we are building Chipata Trades and we have struggled to finish —on another we are selling complete assets. In what ever way you look at it, NAPSA being independent with its own board, this still falls back on government to make rational decisions on behalf of its people and the community.
We have a situation where Ministry of Lands, RDA, Works and Supply are sitting in one space—the simple reason is obviously lack of space. So letting this into private hands is not something i would advocate for. There is more Boma can do with this building even if it was to go off NAPSAs hands so that it continues to work as a service vehicle to the residents of Chipata and the country at large.
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