THE contractor who built the houses that angered President Hifikepunye Pohamba at Walvis Bay this week said the National Housing Enterprise shot down their plans to make a few changes to improve the structures described by some as ‘cubicles’.
Property developer Collin Venaani, who partnered a South African company called 7 Sirs Group, received a N$441million mass housing tender to build 1 595 houses at the harbour town.
President Pohamba on Tuesday handed over 89 of the houses to beneficiaries but was not impressed and he castigated NHE’s chief executive officer Vinson Hailulu for the houses, which he said were designed and constructed like structures from the apartheid era.
Confronting Hailulu in front of the media and high-ranking officials, Pohmaba said he was worried about the safety of the occupants because the houses only have one door.
“If a fire comes from this side (blocking the only exit), these people will die,” Pohamba angrily told Hailulu and the Minister of Regional and Local Government and Housing and Rural Development, Charles Namoloh.
Pohamba accused Hailulu of abdicating the responsibility given to him by the State to ensure that the people were provided with quality houses.
“We gave you a responsibility and you are not attending to the responsibility we gave you,” he told Hailulu. “You recruit people from South Africa to come build houses like this for us. What is that? It is because you don’t even come here. If you came here you would have rectified this. I am angry with you.”
The President called for the termination of the contractors, the 7 Sir’s Group, if they do not want to change the house plans.
Venaani, DTA president McHenry Venaani’s younger brother, told The Namibian yesterday that they made several proposals to NHE to improve some of the designs but their efforts were blocked.
“We have seen those mistakes in NHE and proposed our own plans but they wanted us to go with their plans,” he said, adding that they had to toe the NHE line or risked losing the project.
Venaani also admitted that the extra changes to the houses will cost an additional amount.
Hailulu told The Namibian yesterday that the President had “genuine concerns” which NHE is obliged to respond to and rectify.
“We have been building this type of houses throughout the country before and there was never an issue with Core 5 and 6 having to have two doors. But nevertheless, if the President has the desire, we’ll respond to it,” he said.
Hailulu also said the plans were approved by the housing ministry and Walvis Bay municipality, and that he has already instructed the contractor to start rectifying the houses, which was embarked on yesterday.
According to Hailulu, the process would be completed by next week, and a report will be presented to Pohamba.
“It might be a small house now but as the financial position of the household improves they will be able to extend. The houses already come with extension plans,” he said.
Asked about the cost implications, he said that it would be covered under a contingency provision, which is 10% of the contract value.
The completed houses comprised of 33 ‘Core 5’ units; 33 ‘Core 6’ units; 16 ‘Core 7”; and seven “Core 7” units.
The ‘Core 5’ unit, which is the smallest and cheapest in the mass housing series of models, is 35,80 square metres in size and costs N$235 800 to build.
A government subsidy of 60% on the cost means that the house will be worth N$94 000, requiring an instalment of N$620 with a 5% interest annually.
The Namibian reported this week that the government wanted to woo voters just in time for tomorrow’s elections by giving out 1 000 houses, but that failed and it was forced to hand out the houses at Walvis Bay.
The houses handed over by the President might not necessarilly provide the complete picture of the actual prices of all the other houses since that decision is yet to be made by the housing ministry together with the Ministry of Finance.
The public grilling of Hailulu and Namoloh comes at a time when NHE is being accused of sidelining officials from other ministries.
In June this year, Pohamba rejected ministerial advice to strip the NHE of the mass housing custodianship, proposing that loopholes can be filled while the project continues.
Namoloh has also been ignored by NHE bosses who have refused his directive for the contracts to be renegotiated.
NHE awarded two-year tenders for the construction of 10 137 houses countrywide to 25 companies for N$2,9 billion despite an outcry from stakeholders that middlemen companies had inflated prices which would lead to pushing the prices of the houses up.
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