The government will spend an estimated Rwf504 million to develop master plans for seven districts to ensure sustainability of land use and facilitate investments.Currently, seven districts out of 30 have no master plans, according to James Kamanzi, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Infrastructure.According to the districts’ master plan execution paper formulated by the Rwanda Housing Authority (RHA), the seven local development plans in the pipeline are those of Gisagara (Rwf63m), Rulindo (Rwf64m) and Ngororero (Rwf63m).Others are for the districts of Nyamagabe (Rwf80m), Rutsiro (Rwf80m), Burera (Rwf73m) and Gicumbi (Rwf77m).RHA oversees the implementation of the national housing, urbanisation, construction and government assets management policies, through coordination, conception, development, monitoring and evaluation of actions and programmes. By the beginning of 2012, only 16 districts had master plans. Seven others were completed recently.Government is targeting end of this year for all the 30 districts to have master plans.“The master plans for the remaining seven districts are being developed, and they are scheduled to be completed by the end of June,” Kamanzi said.Esther Mutamba, the Director General of RHA, said that plans for the implementation studies of some districts with master and local development plans are underway.“Plans for Gasabo, Kicukiro, Nyagatare, Kayonza, Rwamagana, Karongi and Rusizi are conceptual and we are working on developing detailed plans,” said Mutamba.Currently, only the Central Business District – Nyarugenge – has a Physical Detailed Master Plan (PDMP).The PDMPs for Gasabo and Kicukiro are slated to be completed by December at a tune of about Rwf2 billion.On the other hand, local development plans for other districts, she added, were completed with implementation studies ongoing.
