16 Mar 2021

Members of the Ghanzi East Sub-district Council - SHAA committee recently hosted their Okavango Sub-district Council counterparts, on an integrated poverty alleviation and housing project benchmarking exercise.

Briefing the visitors, the technical officer, Mr Ponalo Raditloaneng said there were evident dividends for beneficiaries, from the project which started production of bricks in 2001.

Mr Ponalo said since inception, 10 beneficiaries had been able to construct houses from wages earned, adding that currently, they were helping five other beneficiaries, as funds were being deducted from their monthly wages.

Despite  the great benefits of the project to the beneficiaries, Ghanzi East Sub-district Council, chief physical planning housing and estate management officer, Mr Nchunga Kanyenvu said it was running at a loss and they had since taken a decision to pay each beneficiary per bag of cement to improve production.

In an interview after visiting the project, Okavango Sub-district Council SHAA committee chairperson, Ms Ikakanye Nkate said the purpose of the visit was  to appreciate challenges and successes of the  integrated poverty alleviation and housing project as they were to start a similar one  in April.

Okavango Sub-district Council Assistant Council Secretary, Mr Losika Kula said they were targeting 33 beneficiaries from the whole sub-district, with a view to increase target with time.

Mr Kula said the project would not only give the beneficiaries dignity through building them decent homes, but would also change the outlook of the sub-district.

He said because of availability of bricks in the area, residents would now start building brick houses as opposed to the current reed structures.

He said they intended to produce ample bricks to support Community Constituency and RADP projects, as well as individuals.

He said they aimed to deploy machinery to improve productivity and would use surface water or condemned boreholes water for the project, instead of potable water. Ends