The allocation for the housing sector in this year’s budget supersedes last year’s by some $500M and special emphasis would continue to be placed on low-income earners, Housing and Water Minister Harry Narine Nawbatt said on Monday.
The minister was at the time delivering his presentation in the National Assembly as part of the 2007 budget debate. Commenting on the successes in the sector over the last couple of years, Nawbatt said that the Govern-ment of Guyana/Inter-Ameri-can Development Bank low income settlement project achieved an overall completion rate of 95% up to last year and this is scheduled for completion in May of this year.
He said some $795M was spent last year on housing infrastructure under this project for more than 9,000 house lots in areas including Zeelugt North and Blocks A, B and C Sophia.
Additionally, the minister said 100 lots at Parfait Harmonie under the low income settlements project are to be provided with infrastructure by the end of this year.
He said the ministry intends to spend $1.6B to further enable citizens to own their own homes, provide security of tenure and improve the quality of life in squatter settlements at Parfait Harmonie, Kaneville, Sophia (A&B) and Block 22 Wismar, where in excess of 14,800 persons will benefit.
Another $800M, the minister disclosed, would be spent under the grant funds provided by the European Union for low income housing.
According to the minister, the government would also spend some $350M on the construction of roads, drains and structures in a number of areas including Charity, Anna Regina, Sophia, Bartica, Lethem and Linden.
The ministry of housing also hopes to complete infrastructure works for a further 5,000 lots on squatter settlements and for another 9,000 lots in housing schemes.
Meanwhile, the minister said that the Deeds and Land registries and the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CHPA) have collaborated to speed up the issuing of transports and titles to home owners as the government plans to process a total of 17,000 transports over the next five years.
In the area of electricity, Nawbatt said his ministry intends to work closely with the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) to continue the electrification of housing schemes to increase occupancy and promote more home construction.
As part of this drive too, he noted that the CHPA is working to develop a five- year strategic plan which would ensure its confirmation as an efficient, reliable and transparent agency in its land use and housing mandate.
The minister said, too, that his ministry would continue to work closely with the local financial institutions to enable access to finances for home building by low and moderate income groups.
In this regard he said that letters of assurance negotiated between the minister and those institutions have been of tremendous help to prospective home owners in acquiring mortgages in a timely manner.
However the ministry plans to continue to monitor the rate of occupancy in housing schemes with a view to determining the number of unoccupied lots and the reasons for this and this will be used to inform the decision to repossess the unoccupied lots, the minister said.
Water
In the water sector, the minister revealed that a new customer management and billing system has been installed and is now being finally commissioned for full implementation.
He said to date $335M has been spent on this system, funded by the UK Department for International Develop-ment.
He noted that a ‘Hi Affinity system’ would be fully operational by the end of the first quarter of 2007, and with revenues of $2.6B being projected as achievable during 2007.
He said the ministry was actively considering the use of persons within communities to identify the users who are connected to GWI’s systems, both legally and illegally, to ensure an accurate data base of consumers.
Depending on the success of this initiative, consideration would be given for the reading of meters by those same persons within the communities.
He said, too, that other systems would be introduced to remind customers of their indebtedness by the production of overdue reports.
Payment plans for both metered and unmetered customers would be arranged, including estimation of future consumption and payments on those estimates for metered customers, the minister revealed.
In addition, the minister pointed out that the new billing system would be used to log customer complaints.
He said, too, that concerted efforts to improve the efficiency of GWI have already started and would be an ongoing process. He added that communities would be informed of the dates and places during each month when members of the public would be able to discuss matters affecting them with GWI staff. The ministry also plans to continue to exempt pensioners from paying water tariffs, a concession which cost the government some $98M last year.