The right to adequate housing is guaranteed under international human rights law. This right, like many other economic, social, and cultural rights, is not expressly recognised in the Namibian Constitution though. Namibia, however, ratified some of the major human rights instruments which recognise this right. Importantly, the Constitution embraces an international law-friendly disposition towards international law. It provides, for John B. Nakuta instance,fortheautomaticincorporation of international agreements binding on Namibia into the Namibian legal system. This provision accordingly reads the right to adequate housing into the Namibian legal order. The right to adequate housing, however, is one of the most blatantly violated rights in the country. To this date, no claim has been instituted before the courts claiming, specifically, the right to adequate housing.
Uploaded date: 05 July, 2024
New emerging narratives are exposing the contrast between the current appalling housing situation and the potential possibilities of urban life in Namibia. In this article, I argue that the current housing situation is not only a crisis, but has its origins in Namibia history. The beginnings of urban development in Namibia were anchored in colonialist dispossession and an apartheid- modernist uneven development. To a certain extent, this changed with independence in 1990. The changes also showed the continuities that have allowed the historical crisis to prevail and expand. Two sets of theoretical arguments are advanced to provide the analytical lenses for this process and the present situation. Firstly, a materialist approach that focuses on the political
Namibia’s fraught history of segregation remains the phantom that haunts contemporary urban spaces. The nature of urbanisation, and attendant problems that this process presents – as far as provision of housing is concerned – undoubtedly indicts the history of spatial segregation. Since the lifting of influx control in the mid-1980s, urban areas across Namibia have experienced unsustainable waves of urbanisation and resultant lack of decent housing. This lack of housing has implications for social justice, viz. right to shelter. Archival research findings allow for a retracing of colonial spatial segregation that continues to provide valuable context. This context needs to be thoroughly understood so that a meaningful change of Namibia’s urban spaces ensues. The question of housing provision remains a problem area in most of urban Namibia,
Thisarticledescribestheformsand conditions of access to land, housing and municipal basic service infrastructures among the residents of the precarious urban fringes of Windhoek. It pays particular attention to the ways in which they understand the situation and how they justify their demands of improved access. The article discusses how the issue of urban land, housing and basic services can be interpreted beyond its practical, concrete aspects as simultaneously indexing broader issues such as urban and national citizenship, principles of access and redistribution, and ideals of a good society. Formal mechanisms of access to land and housing, as well as concomitant basic services such as water, electricity, and sanitation, depend on one’s ability to participate in the housing market as a buyer. In contrast, for those who live in informal settlements or
n Namibia access to urban land and housing remains a complex and contentious subject. On the one hand, the pressure on urban land is becoming increasingly acute; on the other, the demand for serviced land and adequate affordable housing is exceeding supply. This paper explores the relationship between gender and access to housing in urban areas and its implications for human rights and gender justice. This article draws on ssecondary data from research reports, official statistics, governmental reports and newspaper articles to analyse women’s access to land and affordable housing. The lack of gender disaggregated data was the greatest limitation to the research. This research uses an Intersectional Feminist approach to housing. It questions whether
Botswana has a land area of 585,370 square kilometres with a small population of just over 2 million according to the 2011 Population and Housing Census . Traditionally a pastoral society, with a predominately rural population, an ever-increasing numbers of Batswana have moved to urban areas and larger villages in the last three decades . In 2000, urban growth rates have been estimated at about 7% per annum (Government of Botswana, 2011) . Between the early 1970s and the early 1990s the percentage of the urban population more than doubled . Botswana instituted a national urban development strategy in 1978 and a national housing policy in 1982 . The government has only provided housing to its direct employees while the urban poor and new migrants from the rural areas have been left to fend for themselves (Mosha, 2010) .
In the era of the commodification of housing where the right to decent shelter was replaced by speculative investment considerations, the case of Uruguay’s housing cooperatives provides a refreshing and fundamentally different alternative . This case study will briefly highlight the social, economic, political and legal factors that contributed to the establishment of the housing cooperative movement and its achievements in Uruguay . By 2018, over 25,000 families were organised in 560 cooperatives and this programme represents one of the world’s most ambitious and radical attempts to solve the housing crisis . It serves as a model to be emulated and adapted to diverse national contexts not only in Latin America but also in other regions of the world (Chavez, 2018) and provides valuable lessons for countries like Namibia .
For many decades, Venezuela has been a country of extreme inequalities which were also reflected in the country’s approach to housing . Insufficient government housing policies resulted in sprawling shanty towns on the outskirts of the cities and this was a common feature until the end of the 20th century (Holldack, 2016) . At the time, Venezuela was characterised by mass poverty and political corruption as well as typical neoliberal economic policies . A small elite reaped the benefits of Venezuela’s national resources, including oil (Jauch & Shindondola, 2008; Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, 2020
This project aims to address some of the challenges associated with the design of affordable housing particularly in the Southern African context . This project will illustrate the role of design when it comes to affordable housing . Housing in general has tended towards an engineering exercise, with architects playing a rather peripheral role in the process . Most housing projects focus on the provision of as many as possible standard “units” on plots, still based on the false notions of a nuclear family . The “unit” offered precedes the actual demands and thus its design is arbitrary .
According to the former deputy minister of urban and rural development, Derek Klazen, Namibia’s housing backlog stands at 300,000 unitscurrently .Thisisahugenumber ifitisconsideredthatthismineral-rich country has a population of only two andahalfmillionandhashad30years of neo-colonialism . In other words, the housing crisis has only worsened during the past three decades under Swapo rule and the vast majority of Namibians do not live in decent housing . Therefore, in housing the Swapo government has been a massive failure . The former deputy minister also suggested that N$76 billion would be required for land servicing and housing construction (The Namibian, 21 September 2020, pg . 9) . This is undoubtedly a significant sum of money but it should be placed in context . Firstly, the Namibian government functions on neoliberal assumptions, i .e ., that the buildin
A large proportion of the urban population in developing countries lives in informal settlements due largely to rapid population growth and widespread poverty . In Namibia, this reality was accelerated by the abolition of the contract labour system, which previously prevented movement to urban centres unless the migrant had secured a job in such cities in advance . The rapid urbanisation process, exacerbated in part by the attainment of independence in 1990, has led many Namibians to shift from rural to an urban areas in search of a better life that independence itself promised to usher in . This trend caught both legislation and institutions off-guard .
Six months after Namibia celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of her independence from South Africa in March 2020, the country is on fire . Hundreds of Namibian activists, students, working youth, and artists have taken to the streets of Windhoek and other towns . The protests started on 7 October 2020 after the body of a young woman was found murdered in the port city of Walvis Bay . Twenty- two-year old Shannon Wasserfall had been missing since April of 2020 . A New Generation of Youth Activists This young generation, triggered by the scourges of femicide and gender-based violence, is tired of living in a violent society . One of their major rallying cries has been #OnsIsMoeg
This incomplete and process-based photo essay is an exhibition of selected photographs representing recent protest performances in Windhoek and Luderitz . I make use of Performative Writing as a method of embodying the work that these protests do, which is to mobilise dialogic action1 and movement formation2 . The performativity of these photographs points towards alternative notions of Publicness, critical visualities and spatial processes, particularly in Namibian urban centres . This essay posits that this protest action and their photographic remnants mobilise Praxis3 that is required for decolonial futures .
This first issue of NJSJ has housing as its focus of discussion . However, since land and housing are inextricably linked (you cannot have a house without land to put it on), it is necessary to give some key facts about the Final Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Claims of Ancestral Land Rights which was released into the public domain on April 21, 2021 and is a 780-page document, now available on the website of the Office of the Prime Minister (https:// opm.gov.na).
Natalia (not real name) is a 51-year- old female head of household who lives in Dolam, Katutura, Windhoek . She and her family live in a corrugated iron structure, constructed in the backyard of the grandfather of her son’s friend . Her household consists of 11 people, that is 6 adults and 5 children under the age of 6 six years . Five of the adults are her children from a previous marriage . She has 2 daughters and 3 sons between the ages of 21 and 30 . Natalia’s family shares the yard with 8 other adults and 10 children who live either in the main house built with bricks or in the corrugated or other iron houses that house other families . One daughter is 24 years old and has four children . Another is 21 years old and has one child . As a single mother, she raised her children in rented corrugated iron houses . Constantly moving from one place to the next with minimum financial assistance from her ex- husband . Natalia’s highest level of education is grade 12, although she also took an
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