Select Page

Occupation certificates for Swakopmund’s Wagdaar settlement

Occupation certificates for Swakopmund’s Wagdaar settlement

By Adolf Kaure.

Approximately 270 Wagdaar informal settlement residents received occupation certificates for their erven on Sunday, 14 May in Swakopmund.

This comes less than a month after ownership certificates were handed to over 800 residents of the DRC settlement.

The ownership certificates have been awarded to the residents to provide tenure security.

In 2019, the residents of DRC Proper were moved from Extensions 25 and 31 to a new location called Wagdaar, which includes Extensions 40, 41 and 42.

“This relocation was intended to serve Extension 31 by accommodating some DRC Proper residents whose plots no longer existed due to a new permanent design,” said Swakopmund mayor Dina Namubes.

Council has always had long term plans to develop DRC Proper. However, the Mass Housing Development Programme, funded by the central government, funded the servicing of Extensions 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 and 37.

A contractor, Strydo Construction, was hired to implement the town council’s service plan and to install bulk services in these extensions. However, the contractor faced difficulty starting civil works in Extension 31 because of its high population density, leading to the relocation of residents to Wagdaar in 2019.

“Initially, there was resistance to the relocation process, but eventually the residents realized that Wagdaar, the new area they were relocated to, was well-planned with clearly demarcated plots,” said the mayor.

The town council made provision for basic services such as water standpipes or communal taps, mobile toilets and streetlights.

The relocation of residents to Wagdaar was also a tool to decongest Extension 31 as it was overcrowded.


 

About The Author