By IANS,
Pretoria: South Africa has launched a new housing scheme for the poor in an effort to “reverse the aparthied legacy”.
The programme, Emerald Sky, will go a long way in reversing the apartheid legacy in housing and social planning, President Jacob Zuma said Saturday.
“All human beings strive to obtain decent shelter in a decent community. That is why we are doing all we can to assist our people to obtain affordable and habitable shelter,” Zuma said.
Under the project, aimed at preventing the spiraling of slums in urban areas, the government will provide funds to private developers to build rental homes for low and middle income workers, BuaNews reported.
“You will notice that the new style social housing projects that we are building are on well-located and landscaped land, with access to social amenities such as education, transport, recreational facilities and others,” Zuma said.
The government also plans to spend nearly 15 billion rand ($2 billion) this year to build more than 8,000 settlements across the country.
“We are also upgrading many of the 2700 informal settlements which exist alongside almost every urban and peri-urban town, to address the squalid conditions of those living there,” he added.