One subtle factor which has been identified as a catalyst for the spread of diseases, especially pandemics, is the issue of overcrowding and poor city planning. Undoubtedly, the growth and development of any country’s economy largely depends on the strength and well-being of her people. Since the people within any country constitute the work force of such country, whatever affects their health negatively, such as a pandemic would invariably translate to an adverse impact on their economy.
Generally, some of the ways to guarantee public health is to ensure proper city planning, provide decent and affordable housing and mitigate the growth and development of slums within a country.
With this in sight, the President of the Nigerian Institute of Town Planners, Lekwa Ezutah has emphasized the need for city planning and slums upgrading as part of efforts towards restructuring and repositioning housing as a tool for disease control.
Ezutah, who spoke during HDAN’s recent webinar on the theme: Housing as a Governance Tool and Legislative Response To Poverty And Disease Control”, stated that government must see housing as both an economic venture and also a social activity.
“People have to be housed, people have to have where they live. Right now, we are talking about the lockdown, everybody is back home, and some people don’t have a home. Others can’t even maintain the social distance we are talking about because they are just not conducive. So we need to go back to this very vulnerable people.
“We should go back to planning first before we start talking about any other thing. We should also talk of upgrading the slums. A lot of people are in those places not out of choice but because they have no alternative. The government must see housing as both an economic venture and also a social activity” he said.
Ezutah also explained that there is the need to plan for the future, re-plan existing places and also ensure the availability of basic facilities at the appropriate locations, as slum proliferation has always been associated with increased crime and rates, hence the need to upgrade slums all over the country.
“We need to plan for the future, re-plan existing places so as to ensure we have the basic facilities at the appropriate locations. Basic facilities and so on at the appropriate locations very important. It would influence the affordability of these houses. If I’m staying in a place where I don’t spend so much going to work, my disposable income immediately increases. Then I would be able to afford a house I’ve not been able to afford. There are people who obviously cannot own houses, we must be talking about rental accommodation for them.
The NITP boss also reiterated the urgent need for planning cities and upgrading slums stating that “We must have to take planning of our settlement very seriously and that would also include upgrading of the slums. They are now so many, and the population they are accommodating is almost getting to more than 40% for the populace and that is dangerous because slim is associated with crime and all that, so we need to take serious action with respect to upgrading our slums all over the country. Not just in Abuja, slums all over.
“For the people who are living in the slums, we need to have a second look at the slums, see how we re-plan them so as to upgrade them and then in planning, of course we should be planning before we start talking about these houses. Where are they being located?” he said.
He however highlighted the importance of infrastructure to housing and health, adding that emphasis should not only be placed on housing finance but also on the need for proper siting of the houses in appropriate location.
“Each time we talk about housing in this country, I get worried because there are overemphasis on finance and not where these houses are located, the environment in which they are located, when I’m talking about the environment this time, I’m talking about the infrastructure, the facilities, and the services. If you want me to stay in a place, it must be conducive and must have the facilities, water, light, access road light and water. This should be the basis, then my children should be able to get to school on time without much difficulties and so on.
“The first thing we should do is to go back to planning so that we are able to locate activities, places of employment, schools, offices as appropriate in relation to where people live, bearing in mind their level of income because even if you have what we call low income housing, affordable housing and you locate it at a distance from the persons place of employment, the tendency is that you will spend so much money on transportation that overtime he may have to relocate either where he’s paying less in terms of the rent, and this causes a lot of problem for residents of our city” he said.
Ezutah, further spoke about the need for the domestication of the National housing code saying, “We are now talking about housing code and we are talking about the national assembly. Even if the national assembly passes it as a law, the state has to domesticate them, if they don’t, we will still have the kind of problem we are having with planning”.
