Manyame updates housing waiting list

Lovemore Meya Herald Correspondent
Manyame Rural District Council is updating its housing waiting list, which stands at 63 000. The council has also extended the deadline for renewal of annual subscriptions for those on the waiting list to the end of December.

Over 718 applicants have renewed their status as of the initial call which ended on November 30.

The list is clogged with home-seekers who applied for residential stands seven years ago, but never returned to renew it.

Manyame RDC chief executive Mrs Farirai Guta said the extension was a result of low uptake after their announcement for renewals.

“We are updating our waiting list which currently has 63 000 applications, but only 718 have come to renew by end of November,” said Mrs Guta.

“We hope this will give more time to genuine home-seekers to come and renew their waiting list. The number has continued to balloon as some applicants came to apply years back and never renewed afterwards. This means we were only considering those who responded by November 30. Now we are giving a chance to those who could have missed the chance to come forward.”

Mrs Guta said they were no longer considering the old list which was centre-based.

“We are no longer considering the old list,” she said. “Our list is centre-based and include Beatrice, Murisa (Phase 1 and 2) and Dema. Beatrice high density has 82 applicants who renewed out of 4 200 on the old list, medium density 105 and low density 63.

Dema high-density has 113, medium 127 and low 56, while Murisa high-density has 31, medium 94 and low 47.

“The scheme in circulation for Beatrice for approval has 802 medium density stands.

“On the part of low density, we do not have a scheme which is in circulation because for that section we have run out of land.”

In Dema, Mrs Guta said they were working on a low density suburb scheme which had 936 applications.

“The number of renewals in Dema is standing at 936, it means we are going to accommodate even those who apply now,” she said.

“We intend to start the high-density planning process early next year because this year we had pressure in Murisa where we are doing re-organisations.

“In Murisa, we are working on a low density scheme, but it has some challenges since part of it is still occupied by illegal settlers and where we are able to come up with over 1 000 stands, it leaves us with around 100 which are unoccupied by the settlers.”