The big stink of Maseru

MASERU – FROM litigation to meetings with council officials and MPs, the stink refuses to go for residents of Ha-Tšosane. Thousands of people who are living in the area have for years paid the price of haphazard planning of human settlements by the Maseru City Council. A dumpsite that has become a health hazard showcases the troubles of the residents.

Residents’ representatives have for the past decade been to the Ministry of Local Government, the Maseru City Council (MCC) and the parliamentary Public Accounts

Committee (PAC) seeking intervention without success. Last year they took the MCC to court. The case is yet to be heard.

The residents approached the court after the MCC threatened them with eviction, claiming that they built their houses around the dumpsite without the municipality’s authorisation.

Residents at Ha-Tšosane say instead of moving them, the council should close the “filthy landfill”.

Some have been angered by comments made by the council spokesperson, ’Makatleho Mosala, who previously told thepost that the residents were illegal occupants who should be removed without compensation.

The infamous dumpsite is very close to residential houses and poses a health risk.

“The houses were built after the city made that area a dumpsite,” Mosala said. “That dumpsite existed a very long time ago. Actually that was a quarry pit and then later was turned into a dumpsite,” she said. “Even if you go there you will find that some of the houses are still new and others are just very close to it.”

Mosala had said “most of those people, some of them were not given the green light by the Maseru City Council to build in that area because there was already a dumpsite there. Those illegal site occupants will be removed without any compensation.”

She said the council had already told the residents to leave, although negotiations are still ongoing.

But the residents are having none of it. Together with their chief, they have dared the council to execute its threat and “see what happens”.

Chief Michael Ramosalla told thepost this week that he was shocked to learn that some of the residents will be removed from the village. He claimed that people settled in the area long before the council established the dumpsite.

He said the quarry referred to by Mosala was first situated about five kilometres from the current location and this was before Maseru’s population boomed.

“There were already people living here. So it’s obvious that the quarry came to the people, people didn’t go to the quarry. The quarry came to the village,” fumed Chief Ramosalla.

He said the villagers were told that it was a temporary arrangement when the quarry was turned into a dumpsite. The dumpsite was established in 1983, decades after people began settling there, he said.

“This village has always existed,” Chief Ramosalla said.

Many residents said they will resist any attempts to evict them. Some attribute the problem to failure by authorities to plan the town.

In an effort to resolve the planning mess, the National University of Lesotho (NUL) is now offering a new course in the faculty of Geography and Environmental Sciences called Legal Aspects of Planning.

The course, introduced by former MCC Town Clerk, Advocate ’Mantai Seeko, aims to equip students with the main principles of planning.

“When you come to Lesotho, it is almost as if there are no planners,” Advocate Seeko said.

She was speaking at an indaba on urban planning held by the Lesotho Town and Regional Planning Institute (LTRPI) in Maseru last week.

“The majority of the planning that takes place in the country is done by the Maseru City Council. Unfortunately, there are planners practising this profession who have not obtained the correct educational qualifications,” she said, adding that “it is important to professionalise this institute so that it can be the voice to tell the MCC and other ministries that they are not qualified planners”.

Lesotho is faced with a major land-use crisis due to lack of plan-led developments, in particular towns and urban areas.

The town is characterised by informal developments, with many people living in unplanned and informal settlements.

Planning is a technical and political process that is focused on the development and design of land at different spatial scale, city scale down to districts and neighbourhoods with focus on where development should occur and where it should not.

Many participants at the planning indaba last week said the planning law in Lesotho has become useless and this is evidenced by the rapid growth of informal settlements on agricultural land as well as traffic congestion at major intersections in the capital city

“Planning is not recognised both legally in terms of legislation and as a profession,” one participant said.

Some voiced their desire and willingness to professionalise planning and help raise the standard of planning practice in Lesotho.

“Professionalising planning would be a positive step forward and aid in Lesotho’s proper spatial development and all matters of the built environment,” Teboho Lebusa, president of the Lesotho Town and Regional Planning Institute, said.

The institute is aiming to push for the reform of the planning law in Lesotho, particularly the Town and Country Planning Act (TCPA) of 1980.

The envisioned reform would include making it mandatory for all practising planners to be legally registered with the institute so that only qualified and competent professionals practice town planning.

“We can agree that indeed the current state of affairs, evidenced by the crippled, haphazard and chaotic nature in the development and use of land in our country leaves much to be desired,” Lebusa said.

The institute aspires to ensure efficient and productive use of land in Lesotho, and to grow and professionalise the institute as a leading entity in matters of planning in the country.

It plans to do so by establishing and maintaining fruitful relationships with all stakeholders in planning issues, including government agencies, parastatals, NGOs, individuals and other professional organisations both domestically and internationally.

Last year, then Trade Minister Dr Thabiso Molapo, talked about the Lesotho Urban Agenda which he said aims to elevate the standing of urbanisation within the Lesotho

Strategic Development Plan and foster a sustainable and competitive urban development system that will contribute to Lesotho’s economic, social and environmentally sustainable development.

Dr Molapo was presenting the Lesotho’s urban agenda at the 18th Private Consultative Meeting between stakeholders. Dr Molapo said the 21st century will be the century of cities, saying by 2050, at least 70 percent of the world population will live in cities even though Lesotho will not meet that rate.

Dr Resetselemang Leduka, a renowned National University of Lesotho (NUL) academic who wrote several papers on urbanisation issues, observed shocking factors on why Lesotho towns are not properly planned.

In a paper titled Land Governance in Lesotho, published in 2019, Leduka and other researchers noted that despite the Land Act of 2010 and the institutional framework of land administration that it created, “the governance and management of land remains chaotic at best ‘’.

They found that numerous agencies and government ministries and departments in one way or the other are claiming some stake in land matters.

The 2000 Land Policy Review Commission noted that the management of land was the responsibility of no less than nine different government agencies, each making decisions independently.

The agencies were the Land Use Planning, which was, until recently, located in the Ministry of Agriculture, the Directorate of Lands, Surveys and Physical Planning (the lands and surveys part of the former LSPP that now partially constitutes the Land Administration Authority (LAA).

Other agencies were the Deeds Registry, which was moved from the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights), the Ministries of Public Works and Transport, Trade and

Industry, Natural Resources, Tourism, Sports and Culture, Environment, Gender and Youth Affairs, Education and Finance, Maseru Municipal Council (MMC) and the Lesotho Housing and Land Development Corporation.

The Ministry of Local Government also routinely acts alone outside of the LAA and local authorities, and urban and community councils, as well as customary chiefs, according to government findings in 2015.

At the helm of land governance in Lesotho is the Ministry of Local Government and Chieftainship, which is responsible for policy formulation and coordination of all other institutions involved in land governance.

Land agencies that fall under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Local Government are the Department of Lands Survey and Physical Planning – the Physical Planning section of this department is responsible for urban land use planning and control in Planning Areas.

The Land Use Planning section is responsible for coordinating planning in rural (community) council areas.

The Land Administration Authority (LAA) is a parastatal land agency that is responsible for national cadastre, mapping, land administration, and the registration of land titles and deeds.

The Lesotho Housing and Land Development Corporation (LHLDC), a parastatal agency, is mandated with undertaking land development (site-and services) and housing for all income groups, either for sale or rental and to assist the private sector entities to develop land and housing.

There are also Principal Chiefs who are customary authorities whose main mandate in land matters is to control and issue grazing permits for mountain rangelands in accordance with the Animal Husbandry Act 1969 (Act No. 22 of 1969).

Mountain rangelands do not fall under the jurisdiction of any local government structures.

Local councils are mandated with undertaking physical and land use planning and site allocation functions in their respective areas of jurisdiction.

Municipal and urban councils are responsible for physical planning, site allocation, and control of building permits.

The Dr Leduka-led study found that real estate companies do not have specialised legislative provisions, although they are serving high income populations in gated estates with high tech security installations and for the middle income with basic sub-divisions and surveyed plots.

The study also found that field owners and customary chiefs are “an extra-legal activity and takes over the legal responsibility of municipal/urban councils”.

It was also observed in the Trade Ministry’s 2015 report that “land-related management is uncoordinated, siloed and the site of struggle among government agencies”.

“At national level, for instance, control of land use/physical planning is entangled in struggles between agencies in the Ministry of Local Government and Land

Administration Authority,” noted the Leduka-led research.

“At local levels, similar struggles exist between local councils and customary chiefs,” stated the research paper.

The Town and Country Planning Act of 1980 is the principal legislation that regulates land use planning in urban areas.

It gives the planning authority the legal mandate to prepare development plans for areas that are designated as planning areas and establishes a Town and Country

Planning Board for the purpose of examining development plans and making recommendations to the Local Government Minister for approval.

The Act says a development plan should indicate “…the manner in which it is proposed that the area in question shall be used and developed, and the stages by which the development shall be carried out”.

In terms of the law, the development plan becomes a legally binding document to which all land development within the planning area must conform.

The Leduka-led study found that development plans did not comply fully with the requirements of the legal framework.

For example, the study found, none of the plans had undergone the 5-yearly review process that is prescribed by the law.

With the probable exception of the Maseru Development Plan, none of the plans went through the formal legal approval process in accordance with the law, according to the study.

Staff Reporter