HLB in massive infrastructural development drive

Dumisani Nsingo recently in Hwange
THE Hwange Local Board has engaged three financial institutions to fund massive infrastructural developments in its area of jurisdiction.

HLB chief executive officer Mr Ndumiso Mdlalose said the three financial institutions are the Infrastructure Development Bank of Zimbabwe (IDBZ), National Building Society and FBC Building Society who will fund housing projects while another company has proposed to set up a solar power plant.

He said one of the companies contracted by the IDBZ for the development of 2 000 titled serviced residential stands at New Empumalanga suburb has started carrying out feasibility studies on the site. IDBZ allocated the local authority $6 million for the housing project which would also see the financial institution constructing a 10 kilometre road network within the new suburb as well as installing street lights and refurbishing a sewer plant that has been malfunctioning for more than 10 years.

“For the IDBZ project, we expect the contractors to be on site starting next week. I’m aware there is already one on site but the IDBZ is saying by the end of next week (this week) almost all the contractors should be on site. These contractors are meant to provide services like roads-road infrastructure from up to surfaced roads and we also expect them to put up solar street lights at our request.

“We have a passion for solar power. So we are going to be putting solar street lights throughout the project. We also expect them (IDBZ) to do an additional six kilometres of tarred roads. Initially the project was supposed to do just four kilometres but the total length is 10 kilometres so with the coming on board of IDBZ we are able to have all the stretch of 10 kilometres tarred and then infrastructure of water and sewer for the 2 000 stands will be taken over by IDBZ,” said Mr Mdlalose.

IDBZ is also going to re­fur­bish the Em­pumalanga high den­sity sub­urb’s sew­er­age plant, which has been non-func­tional for more than 10 years. The Em­pumalanga plant ser­vices a pop­u­la­tion of over 6 000 peo­ple.

“The Empumalanga sewer treatment plant, which had been defunct for the past 10 years, has also been adopted in the programme. It’s going to be refurbished, where there is need for re-adjustments, re-designed it’s also going to be done. We are also going to insist and its has been agreed by IDBZ that we will run the treatment plant on solar power, in the same way in which the Baobab treatment plant which is ready to be commissioned was done,” Mr Mdlalose.

The Baobab sewer plant caters for 500 hous­ing units and its re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion pro­gramme was funded by IDBZ at a cost of $300 000 and the work is be­ing car­ried out by Wood­ton En­gi­neer­ing. Due to the non-func­tion­ing of its two waste wa­ter treat­ment plants, the lo­cal au­thor­ity has been dis­pos­ing raw ef­flu­ent into nearby streams.

Mr Mdlalose said NBS had engaged the local authority with a view of offering mortgages to beneficiaries of the 2000 title serviced stands.

“The beneficiaries of these stands will have an opportunity to get mortgages from NBS, its available to those that want the facility and I am sure the majority if not all will take up that offer so that in the shortest possible time we could see developed houses in that area as opposed to a situation where you would have serviced stands and people take forever to develop them. For us it’s a plus in that the town grows and housing stock increases and for the beneficiaries get to be housed instead of holding on to just a stand,” he said.

The local authority has also approved an application from FBC Building Society for the construction of 1 000 housing units.

“As I speak right now physical planning is on the ground for the next one and a half weeks they will be identifying and producing a layout plan for that bank (FBC Building Society) and as soon as the layout plan is available the bank will move on site to do the pegging, servicing and then construction. So we expect that during the course of this year we should be seeing housing units coming up, initially on the 2000 IDBZ stands and this other 1000 stands,” Mr Mdlalose.

Hwange urban has a housing backlog of 9 000 and these housing projects would go a long way in reducing the number of home seekers.

“I am also aware that the IDBZ has an interested in increasing the number from 2 000 going up wards…that’s a huge contribution from a small local authority in terms of Zim-Asset targets for housing units which we are expected to produce as a province (Matabeleland North). So it’s likely we are going to be the biggest contributor in the province for housing units.

“We are very excited and proud of that development. It has taken us a long time to court these investors so we are at this moment enjoying the fruits of hard work we have put into this and the positive returns that we are now seeing,” said Mr Mdlalose.

HLB would soon commission its first clinic since establishment in 1974 all along the local authority has been utilising a house as its health centre.

“We are happy to announce that in the next few weeks we will be commissioning a new state-of-the-art clinic, we have managed to build this clinic from council’s own resources and there were no loans advanced to the council, it was just from our own resources,” said Mr Mdlalose.

A local company, Adamaris Investment has applied for 6400 hectares for the constructing of a 200 megawatt solar power plant from the local authority.

“We have managed to attract some company which wants to establish a solar power station, so we are proud to say if this project comes up as expected it should be contributing significantly to power generation in this country and if that power is going to be consumed largely by the Hwange town it means the other power that would otherwise have been consumed from Zesa can then be channeled to other productive sectors of the economy.

“To us it’s an exciting development especially given that we are now investing and embracing latest technologies, green technologies .We are also contributing consistently with the detects of Zim Asset to validation and beneficiation, so we are excited with these projects. That’s basically the projects that we have at the moment,” said Mr Mdlalose.

Hwange is one of the oldest towns in Zimbabwe having originated from settler mining at the beginning of the last century. Its growth has generally been driven by coal mining, with its core being that of satisfying mining activities. Consequent to population growth it has grown to become a major district centre performing regional functions that are administrative and commercial in nature. It boasts the biggest thermal power station in the country, Hwange Power Station.

However, the imbalances caused by the apportioning of land by big companies namely Hwange Colliery Company Limited, Zesa’s subsidiary Zimbabwe Power Company and the National Railways of Zimbabwe has resulted in the area recording stunted growth and slow progress towards attaining town status.

As it stands, Hwange is a local board authority created by the constitution of the country and by statute under the body of the Urban Councils Act, Chapter 29:15. The local authority only oversees service provision in Empumalanga high density, Baobab and Chibondo medium-density suburbs.

@DNsingo