| Slum Upgrading Initiatives
Cities Without Slums Sub regional Programme for Eastern and Southern Africa
During the World Urban Forum, in May 2002, UN-HABITAT presented a slum upgrading initiative to Member States ( South Africa , Kenya , Uganda , Tanzania , Ethiopia , Malawi , Mozambique , Lesotho and Zambia ) and international agencies. The objective of the programme is to work with Member States in the Sub Region to realize the Millennium Declaration Goal Cities Without Slums , strengthening institutional arrangements and partnerships that support the improvement of conditions of living and working in slums in select cities of Eastern and Southern Africa. Ethiopia , Mozambique , Zambia , South Africa , Kenya , Uganda , Tanzania , Malawi and Lesotho are the first nine countries that have been selected to pilot the initiative. UN-HABITAT will assist Member States strengthen the conditions for citywide slum upgrading using a multi-level intervention strategy national, local and at the level of individual informal settlements. Read more
In the Eastern and South African region, the programme is being initiated in 9 countries; Uganda , Tanzania , Lesotho , Mozambique , South Africa , Ethiopia , Kenya , Zambia , and Malawi . Already exploratory missions have been conducted to various cities in the sub-region including Arusha, Maseru, Maputo, Kampala, Durban and Addis Ababa to determine the situation and identify areas where intervention can assist in the improvement of the lives of people living in informal settlements.
Discussions have been held with member states, cities and partners through the exploratory missions, on the need to include and consult all stakeholders in the preparation of action plans and strategies for implementation of the citywide slum upgrading under the programme. Already MoUs and ToRs have been drafted in collaboration with our partners in the said cities, in readiness for further action
What follows is a brief on the current situation in each of the countries:
Ethiopia
An exploratory mission to Addis Ababa was engaged in February 2004, during which, meetings with the relevant Ministries, NGO's and CBO's in charge of land issues and slum upgrading in Ethiopia were held.
Kenya
The Cities Without Slums Programme will be incorporated in the UN-HABITAT led Urban Management Programme for the Lake Region, in the city of Kisumu. Already a City Development Strategy has been developed to including an Action Plan for Kisumu. The material is being analyzed to see if there are any gaps left to finalize the CWS inception phase. Kisumu will then be ready to engage in the preparatory phase. Read More
Lesotho
The Terms of Reference adapted for Lesotho and the communique sent in August 2003, have both been accepted as they stand by the Cabinet. CWS can now enter the Preparatory phase in the city of Maseru.
Mozambique
The Terms of Reference from Mozambique has been received and UN-HABITAT is making some additional adjustments before sending it back to Mozambique. The TOR should become available in mid 2004. The Mozambique team has already started initial work on the Situation Analysis.
With regard to the Memorandum Of Understanding, it was decided not to have a specific CWS communique until the MOU being discussed with 3 departments of the Mozambique government is completed. This MOU will go through UNDP. The agreement was that UN-HABITAT would be signing a large scale MOU with the Government of Mozambique as whole first (they are working with 3 departments), prior to signing specific MOUs for programmes such as CWS.
South Africa
In Durban , the Cities without Slums Sub-regional Programme for Eastern and Southern Africa is being engaged in collaboration with the Cities Alliance' ‘3 Cities Project' and the Global Campaign for Secure tenure. The three initiatives have provided and continue to provide an opportunity for federations of slum dwellers, support NGOs and the municipal authority of Durban to document their experiences in urban upgrading. Specifically, these three initiatives have assisted local actors translate their experiences into models, frameworks, and concrete action plans for citywide slum upgrading. The City of Durban is putting together a proposal for the incorporation of the initiative in the 3 Cities project
Tanzania
UN-HABITAT, on 6 February 2004 signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the government (Ministry of Lands and Human Settlements Development) which sets a framework for cooperation and guidance for the implementation of this programme in Tanzania. This MoU also specifies that the programme will be implemented gradually in a number of cities, Arusha being the first from where the experience will gradually be replicated in other locations.
The Cooperation Agreement and a Project Document for the initiation of this activity in Arusha have been prepared as the first step and signed by the Arusha Mayor and the UN-HABITAT Executive Director on 25 May 2004. The implementation process of this first phase is planned for1 June 2004 to 30 May 2005, and the proposed budget is US$ 70,000. from UN-HABITAT and Tsh. 35 million from the Tanzanian Government.
Uganda
In Uganda, the inception mission has been undertaken and discussions have been held with the Ministry of Works and Housing in connection with engaging this initiative with the two Campaigns. In the mean time, UN-HABITAT is working with Kampala City Council, the city of collaboration in the CWS initiative, on its City Development Strategy (CDS). A review of the CDS indicated that it would perhaps be more appropriate to link the CWS initiative with CDS activities particularly the ones on slum upgrading. A mission was undertaken to Uganda in February and discussions were held with the City official including the mayor and town clerk on how the initiative can complement their CDS process. The city officials were requested to review and analysis of the CDS and identify policy, capacity-building and community involvement issues to assist in the development of a Kampala CWS. Discussions have been held with SDI on how they can contribute to this process.
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