Affordable housing is a necessity

Saturday, 11 August 2012 23:27

Munir Daya, SUNDAY MUSING It is estimated that there are some 14 million people renting urban residential units in Tanzania. Most of these people are economically disadvantaged, and cannot afford decent and affordable housing. With an urban growth rate of about 4.5 per cent per annum, the current urban population is expected to rise to about 20 million by the year 2015 which would be over 40 per cent of the total population. Housing is one of the basic necessities of human life. Housing has to be decent enough to preserve human dignity and has to be affordable to a level where it is fairly proportionate to the income of the great majority of families that can barely make their ends meet. Tanzania is a developing country and the majority of  are simply poor by any global standards. There should not be a single family or person who is compelled to "live" on a street and shame the nation only because the country cannot find even a shelter with basic standards for such people. Almost all families which are not “rich” live in slums or squatter areas of the cities and towns in Tanzania. And they are in millions equal to the entire population of a number of small countries combined. The tenancy offered in slum areas is mostly of a single room, with or without electricity, and with one toilet, if it can be defined as one, to be shared among six families. While the rate of inflation keeps on rising and consequently the cost of food also keeps soaring, the levels of wages and day to day income from self-employment remains stagnant to erode spending power and increase the agony from poverty. What is even worse is the practice of private landlords in slum areas to demand payments of housing rents one year in advance from intending tenants whose wages are monthly. In the case of the unemployed and self-employed, their income is always uncertain. Others who live in basic non-slum areas struggle to pay rent from the income they earn. They too are often compelled to live in miserable conditions. They have limited space which forces them to dry clothes, prepare food, do dishwashing and store things in one room. In such basic flats, corridors and balconies are sometimes used for cooking and in other flats corridors have been extended and fitted with windows to serve as an additional bedroom. Refrigeration is done in one of the bedrooms as the kitchen is too small to accommodate a fridge. Tanzania has a fast growing population and many families have at least three or four children. In such housing, the problem of where to sleep is cumbersome with parents being forced to share their bedroom with their children. According to the constitution of Tanzania, the primary objective of the government is the welfare of the people. The overwhelming aspect of such welfare is accessibility to decent and affordable housing. There is only one mortal life to live in this world. The average span of life in countries south of the Sahara is said to be only 48 years. With the misery that millions go through without decent places to live, one wonders if there is a life before death for such people. The denial and unavailability of affordable housing is a violation of human rights. The plight of millions of Tanzanians who continue to suffer needs to be addressed, and urgently so.