Marching orders : Who first PM or slum dwellers?
Written by Admin on Saturday, September 6th, 2008
CROWDED COMMUNITIES
Marching orders : Who first PM or slum dwellers?
ANCHALEE KONGRUT
Which group of people will be happiest if Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej decides to quit? The People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD)? Members of the middle class in Bangkok?
The answer may vary.
There is, however, another group of people in Bangkok who are extremely unhappy with Mr Samak, as they may have to move out of the city if he stays on to implement his policy.
These people’s voices are scarcely heard over the political din and their problem is not a popular topic. This group comprises hundreds of thousands of poor people who live in decrepit crowded communities in Bangkok, commonly called slums.
Last month, Mr Samak announced his plan to relocate 1,700 slums out of Bangkok to make way for ”lungs” or green areas for the city’s middle class.
The premier wants to relocate these poor people to Ban Ua-arthorn, the government-supported highrise housing project for low income people.
Ban Ua-arthorn was one of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s populist policies. The project, however, was investigated for corruption and collusion among contractors and officials at the National Housing Agency (NHA), the agency overseeing this project. Many buyers have complained that the houses are sub-standard. Many homes under this project have been left unoccupied.
To revive the Ban Ua-arthorn project, Mr Samak and state agencies want the slum communities to move into these highrise flats, many of which are located in the suburbs. For the authorities, the project is a magic-pill solution as the relocation would solve the problem of slum communities in Bangkok and make use of the unpopular Ban Ua-arthorn project at the same time.
The problem of crowded communities seems to be a persistent one for every government. The NHA once built housing for the poor in the suburbs and moved some of them out during the late ’80s to early ’90s. The result was dismal _ many residents simply moved back to live in the city.
For now, the race seems to be on for the targeted 1,700 slums and for PM Samak _ who will go first?
But if the people looked at the problem more closely, they would see that Mr Samak was hardly the source of their misery. Indeed, every government that has come to power has always viewed slum communities as a problem that must be moved out at all costs.
Somsook Boonyabancha, director of the Community Organisation Development Institute (Codi), does not agree. It is not always necessary to move crowded communities out to solve problems associated with them _ poor hygiene, drugs and juvenile delinquency.
”Indeed, there is a mechanism which has proved that it can solve slum problems without having to move the people out. It is a win-win situation. Its philosophy is to help slum dwellers help themselves. When you can solve problems associated with the existence of slums, you can also solve the poverty problem overall,” said Ms Somsook.
She was talking about Ban Mankong _ a sister project of Ban Ua-arthorn. The difference is that Ban Mankong focuses on the participation of poor people while Ban Ua-arthorn focuses on finding a private sector to build flats for low-income groups.
Ms Somsook’s organisation, Codi, is the one overseeing the project. Codi helps community people set up a savings group and improve their own environment. A strong community group which has a problem with land purchase can ask Codi to negotiate with the landlord or advance them loans to buy the land.
Codi also provides loans for communities which prove they have strong organisation, to build houses. The project does not allow any intervention by construction companies or politicians. Community people have to buy construction materials and help one another build their own houses, which are usually two-storey structures at most.
Under the project, slum dwellers do not have to move out of the place where they have lived. If they do, it is usually only a few kilometres away. The difference is that they have a better home and a better life.
Indeed, Baan Mankong has been a showcase on solutions for urban crowded communities. During the last four years, delegates from countries with slum problems such as Cambodia, Philippines and countries in the African continent have come around to study its implementation.
The project was conceived during the government of Anand Panyarachun in 1992. At that time, Codi took the form of a non-governmental organisation, with 1.2-billion-baht seed money from the government to run the project.
In 2003, former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra adopted the project and named it ”Ban Mankong” and turned Codi into a public organisation under the umbrella of the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security.
Mr Thaksin announced he would use Ban Mankong to reduce the number of slums across the country from 5,000 to 2,000 by the year 2008. Codi received around 2.4 billion baht to spend during 2003-2008. So far, there are almost 1,000 Ban Mankong projects in 230 cities across the country.Judging from its past success, this project should be making progress.
But it is not. Codi is running out of money. Its director has had to ask the ministers responsible to allocate 500 million baht for it in the next fiscal budget _ a move which the Finance Ministry has already rejected.
Last week, Ms Somsook went to meet Anusorn Wongwan, the minister of social development and human security. Again, the request was turned down.
In contrast, the government and officials set the budget for community development programmes at 128 billion baht, or 6.8% of the total budget for fiscal 2009. Up to 10.4 billion baht will go to village investment funds and 21 billion baht to the SML Grant programme. The seemingly failing Ua-arthorn housing project, the sister programme of Ban Mankong, will receive 4.8 billion baht.
