Deep rural Human Settlement Project in Alfred Nzo wins top award
A human settlement project built in the deep rural village of Mbizana, Ebenezer 1000 stands a chance of winning the title of the Best Rural Human Settlement Project in the country after it scooped the best rural housing project at the Eastern Cape Provincial Govan Mbeki Awards held this week.
The location of the Project is in the boundaries of Eastern Cape and Kwa-Zulu Natal Province, where Mbizana residents used to complain about lack of service delivery in comparison with KZN residents.
1000 40m2 houses have been built with installation of partial services which includes Ventilated Improved Pit-Latrines (VIP) toilets and Rain Water Tanks. This includes electrification of all the 1000 Houses. The department spent a budget of R 323 833 351.81 million on this project on installation of services, building of the actual houses.
The complex of the Rural Village has changed completely hence the project has been nominated for the Govan Mbeki Award as one of the Best Rural Project in the Province for 2016. The construction of the houses has improved the living conditions of the beneficiaries, homelessness has been reduced.
The awards are held to honour the late Govan Mbeki. The purpose of the Govan Mbeki awards is to promote and inculcate a culture of excellence within the Human Settlement sector in the delivery of quality human Settlements and dignity to South Africans. The awards encourage all stakeholders in the sector to respond systematically and foster the entrenchment of spatial patterns across all geographic scales that exercabate social inequality and economic efficiency.
This project will now contest for the top spot in the country as the best rural housing project in the national awards to be held later this year. Last year, a project in Dutywa won the award for the best rural housing project.
“We are proud that this year all the projects that won the provincial awards were developed by the provincial department which attests to our monitoring and oversights of projects which has contributed to this huge improvement,” said MEC Helen Sauls-August.
