Housing development, road construction and water supply, the three areas Addis Abeba’s city government says are its top priorities, remain dominant in this year’s budget. Plans for brand new mega projects have been incorporated into the city’s draft plan for the coming fiscal year.
 

The agencies responsible for implementing the proposal–the Housing Development Project Office, the City Roads Authority (AACRA) and the Water and Sewerage Authority (AAWSA) – are also the ones taking the largest slice of the draft budget pie for the next Ethiopian fiscal year which starts this week. Jointly, the agencies, take approximately half of the 6.6 billion Birr proposed budget. The budget, authored by the City’s Finance and Economic Development Bureau, is to be debated by the City Cabinet. 
 

According to the draft plan document authored by the Performance Supervision Department under the Mayor’s Office, the Housing Development Project Office plans to construct 29,250 new houses, including 2,044 in Lideta District under its Local Development Plan (LDP) pilot project.
 

The administration under Mayor Kuma Demeksa intends to spend 236 million Br to develop the Lideta area neighbourhood and to finance the construction of 2,044 condominium houses designed to accommodate middle class families.
 

When the plan becomes a reality, the city government will develop a 25hct plot on Tesema Aba Kemaw Street; an area otherwise known as Goma Kuteba, and another 25hct of land behind Hotel De’ Afrique.
 

The construction of 21,446 regular condominium houses and finalization of an additional 20,750 houses, began during the previous fiscal year and are 20pc complete, are also part of the plan for the project office. 
 

The office plans to procure 500,000tns of cement from both local and foreign companies and to import 40,200tns of reinforcement bars into the country for these projects.
 

Historically, condominium construction has struggled to meet expectations. In 2005, Arkebe Oqubay’s Provisional Administration planned to construct 50,000 houses within three consecutive years spending 1.5 billion Br. This period was considered a boom period of construction, especially for condos in Addis and major regional towns.  

 

Arkebe’s administration actually only managed to construct 9,958 houses at a cost of 302.6 million Br during the 2005/06 fiscal year. This occurred despite technical assistance from the Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Technische Zusmmenarbeit (GTZ), a German technical cooperation agency.
 

That same year, construction of 30,719 houses was launched by the administration. However, over half of the plan was not completed, according to annual report for the year.
 

The Caretaker Administration of Berhane Deressa, which was in office for two years, planned to build 19,361 houses during their first six months in office. However, the administration was able to complete only 6,766.

The incumbent administration under Kuma approved an 8.7 billion Br budget for the previous fiscal year. However, it slashed the 5.5 billion Br budget request from the Housing Development Project Office to 2.5 billion Br.
 

The project office sought to build 55,000 condominium houses during the 2008/09 fiscal year but was told by the City Council to complete 33,000 condos remaining from the previous administration. 

Along with the Project Office, the two major infrastructure development agencies – the Addis Abeba Water and Sewerage Authority (AAWSA) and the Addis Abeba City Roads Authority (AACRA) – also have ambitious plans this fiscal year.

The Performance Supervision Department compiles the activities required to implement the plans submitted by each of the agencies as it has to compact and organize the plan for discussions by the City Cabinet.
 

The AACRA has proposed constructing 71.6Km of new asphalt roads; 10Km of detour roads and upgrading 14Km of existing roads.
 

It also plans to undertake design works primarily for a 9.1Km road, (stretching from Tor Hailoch to Adwa Square) and a 27Km road (from Shiromeda via the Long Distance Bus Terminal, Merkato [Abenet] to Meskel Square and then to Kality). These projects are continuations of projects the Authority is working on as part of a goal to achieve a city-wide network of roads.
 

The City Government of Addis Abeba hopes to expand road networks from, the current seven per cent, to 12.8pc by 2011, according to its five-year strategic plan.

For the 2008/2009 budget year, AACRA plans to increase the road coverage from 2,537km to 2,657Km. Kuma’s administration has allocated 1.6 billion Br for the Authority.
 

AACRA’s plan for the next year also includes the construction of five bridges.

However, the Roads Authority is currently revising its plans. The revision is expected to be finalized within this week, according to Fekade Haile (Eng.), general manager of AACRA.
 

“After the revision, the budget we will request may go down from what we have already requested in our earlier budget request,” he told Fortune.

The other priorities of the administration down the list are the  six key areas: capacity building; housing development; potable water supply; expanding small-scale enterprises; road construction; as well as the expansion of social services like health and education,” Fekade said.

Addis Abeba, one of the two chartered administrations in the country  (the other being Dire Dawa)  is not a beneficiary from the Federal Government’s 20.9 billion Br budget subsidies to regional states.
 

The city has to finance itself from its own revenues. The Finance and Economic Development Bureau is in charge of these assignments. The City Cabinet discussed the budget weeks after the Minister of Finance and Economic Development (MoFED) Sufian Ahmed announced federal government’s proposed 54.6 billion Br budget.
 

The city’s proposed budget is morethan eight times smaller than the Federal Government has proposed to spend during the same period.
 

Out of the total 6.6 billion Br, 70pc (4.62 billion Br) would go to capital spending and 30pc to recurrent budget; an amount reserved to pay operational costs and salaries.

The Housing Project Office will take the highest amount of the proposed budget for the next fiscal year, although it is requesting even more than its upper limit of 1.2 billion Br.
 

AACRA plans to spend 3.8 billion Br, according to the draft plan.  Of this, 3.3 billion Br is to be spent on projects to be undertaken by contractors while half a billion Br is slated for projects it will construct independently. 

This fiscal year, AACRA plans to undertake a 43 construction projects, creating new roads and upgrading existing roads; 28 of them will be undertaken by the Authority itself.
 

Eight of the road construction projects the Authority planned to finalize during the previous fiscal year are being transferred to this fiscal year. These include major facelift work on the road running from Meskel Square to the Bole Bulbula Bridge near the Airport section of the Ring Road.
 

The Addis Ababa City Water and Sewerage Authority hopes to enhance its capacity to deliver potable water and to increase the supply from the current 68pc to 85pc during the coming fiscal year.
 

The activities scheduled on the draft plan document include construction of 43 shallow wells with a capacity to generate 60 litres of water per second. In addition, 39 similar wells are also part of the plan. The Authority would also connect the five shallow wells whose construction has already been finalized to the water distribution system of the city.
 

The Legedady Water Refinery Station is also expected to be finalized within the coming two years and would generate an additional 30,000 Cubic metres of water daily. This will allow an additional 272,727 beneficiaries to utilize potable water.

The Authority plans to conclude the ongoing water projects in Burayu, and Gelan towns, under the newly established Special Zone of the Oromia Regional State, which consists of eight towns encircling the city and six weredas. New water projects would also be constructed in the localities at the vicinity of the city which includes the Akaki area and Sebeta town.
 

Addis Abeba’s water supply institution has been working with the Oromia Regional State Water Bureau to supply water for the towns around the city, the water supplied to Addis is either sourced or flows through these towns.
 

However, after the eight towns around the city formed a special zone, the zone and AAWSA began working on a proposal to use the water supply facilities to serve both the city and the respective town of the special zone.
 

By HILINA ALEMU

FORTUNE STAFF WRITER