City residents queue to fill their jerricans with water. Kenya is cited as one of the countries with ‘very high inequality.’ Photo/CHRIS OJOW
The rich, civil servants and the politicians stand to benefit most from reforms that are geared towards improving life in cities in developing countries.
A UN-Habitat study “State of the World Cities 2010/2011: Bridging the Urban Divide” identified urban reforms as an agent of enriching the rich and impoverishing the poor in these countries that include East Africa.
According to the survey of a majority of experts across the world, up to 80 per cent consider these three classes of local and regional economic elites as the main beneficiaries of efforts to make cities better and more efficient while the poor dwellers can only access minimal benefits.
This, the study that was conducted in 30 cities in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, attributes to the fact that the powerful political and interest groups routinely influenced and interfered with inclusive urban policies which are designed to favour all residents, leaving the urban poor with minimal benefits.
“The findings also point to the extent that scarce money is dealt out to non-priority areas because of pressure from interest groups,” the report states.
Besides interfering with the formulation of policies that favour all urban residents, the influences of these powerful groups lead to poor provision of public places and land grabbing.
In instances where inclusive urban policies exist, some residents’ rights are restricted by a disconnect between policy aims and processes of implementation.
Then there is the all too common rush by the middle class to invade residential areas of the poor, especially after slum upgrading projects, further denying the millions of poor residents who dwell in these areas, such new benefits.
In addition to this, the report blames large and riverfront developments for further impoverishing those already poor.
It is in Africa that highest level of inequality was indicated by the experts, at 71 per cent, with a higher likelihood of politicians and bureaucrats corruptly benefiting from urban reforms; it is followed by Asia at 69 per cent and Latin America and Caribbean countries at 59 per cent.
Kenya is cited as one of the countries with “very high inequality” in terms of the urban economic divide.
Other countries mentioned alongside Kenya are Ethiopia, Nigeria and Zimbabwe.
This is however, fairly better than in Namibia, Zambia and South Africa, which the study describes as having “extremely high inequality.”
Model countries in terms of equality in urban centers are: Romania, Bulgaria, Armenia, Belarus, Hungary, Albania, Kosovo, Serbia, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.
These grim findings come as Kenya prepares to host the 46th congress of the International Society of City and Regional Planners in Nairobi in September.
It is co-hosted by the Ministry of Lands.
Lands Minister James Orengo said that the international exposure from hosting the congress would translate into useful policy and technical support.
Poor urban planning is a challenge to countries across the world and with sustained efforts to plan cities underway, the report calls for more inclusive policies that would also see the poor benefit.
Speaking to The EastAfrican, outgoing regional director of the French Development Agency (AFD) Jean-Pierre Mercelli, said East African cities needed to “visualise their cities tomorrow” and design them accordingly.
Besides better health and decent living conditions, cities also require commuter efficient systems that would avoid expensive traffic jams.
“Providing water, energy and others is not enough; we need to think in an integrated manner,” said Mr Mercelli, whose organization is involved in financing urban planning projects including one in Kisumu.
The UN-Habitat report states that many cities still lack the inclusive mechanisms and institutions needed to bridge the urban divide since they failed to devise programmes or take action to reduce inequality and fill gaps in the provision of services.
They also lack the means to anticipate some of the factors causing more inequalities, such as land scarcity and concentration of ownership by the very few; lack of redistributive policies; and ineffective housing markets.
