Kigali's old unplanned suburb of Nyamirambo in the central business district will get a facelift as part of the joint urban development project launched this week by the government and World Bank.

This is one of the city’s oldest suburbs with informal settlements targeted for expropriation to make room for luxury residential buildings, shopping malls, roads, parks and others as provided in the master plan.

But city officials have had challenges in raising funds to compensate affected land owners.

As a component of the Rwf78 billion project, it is also expected to develop the country’s six secondary cities’ roads and sanitation facilities.

Infrastructure Ministry (MININFRA) officials said except for a few residents whose properties may be demolished needed for expansion of roads and drainage, the rest will not be affected.

“Where we have to upgrade settlements we will have lesser expropriation because the owners of the plots will be the ones benefiting from that upgrading,” said Christian Rwakunda, Permanent Secretary at Ministry of Infrastructure.

The 86-hectare area spanning Biryogo, Rwampara, Kiyovu and Agatare cells of Nyarugenge district is home to estimated 19,000 people living in old houses made mostly of mud and wood with corrugated iron sheets roofing.

The number of residents to be displaced is yet to be known, but project surveys indicate that expropriations could affect a big number of those whose properties will be found on the boundaries of the planned infrastructures.

Besides, a number of dwellers, both in Kigali and secondary cities, will be affected without necessarily having to be displaced to give way to the implementation of the respective proposed subprojects.

The agreement of parties to the project indicates City of Kigali and districts that host secondary cities will take charge of the people to be displaced.

Resettlement

This could, according to World Bank representatives, involve guiding the process of acquiring land, valuation, compensation for the land and property as well as resettlement of the displaced persons.

Mr Rwakunda said the costs of expropriation are captured in the project funded 95 per cent by the World Bank while the government set aside Rwf4 billion mainly to cover expropriation costs.

Nyarugenge alone will incur Rwf1 billion on expropriation in the areas set for settlements upgrading.

The government has been struggling to eradicate informal settlements, which still comprise over 50 per cent of Kigali dwellings, as efforts were met with resistance from the low-income people who have nowhere else to settle, coupled with the required huge costs of expropriation.

Past demolitions in Kimicanga and the lower Kiyovu were marred by public grievances over unfair as well as delayed compensation for properties.

Unlike Nyamirambo which is going to be upgraded, old informal settlements prevail in suburbs of Gatsata, Muhima and Gitega, among others.

As houses get dilapidated after the city authorities moved to restrict further construction and renovations in unplanned suburbs, officials insist people in houses deemed prone to disaster risks ought to find somewhere else to settle.

A number of them however decry lack of financial means to resettle in the absence of government help.