Housing
Kenya Coast Portal
Section:
Reviews
Category:
Housing & Settlement
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Number of pages:
20
Year of publication:
2000
Print title:
Macoloo G.C. (2000). Housing. In Hoorweg J., Foeken D. & Obudho R. eds. Kenya Coast Handbook: Culture, resources and development in the East African littoral. (pp.327-344). Hamburg: LIT Verlag.
For reference purposes, cite the following link:
https://www.ascleiden.nl/kenya-coast/reviews/macoloo/housing
Summary/abstract:
The review starts with a historical review of land tenure issues, notably the interplay between Islamic law, African customary land rights and British titular regulations. The prevailing spatial patterns in the rural areas are of villages and individual households dotted across the landscape. Rural house construction is a matter of the individual households concerned without outside assistance. A government loan scheme for rural housing has virtually collapsed due to non-repayment of loans and insufficient public funding. Mombasa is the only large town in the region. The colonial planning system of ‘village lay-outs’ and the design and construction characteristics of the Swahili house are discussed.
The experience with urban housing programmes goes back before independence. After independence three further projects were started in different parts of Mombasa, together with rental and tenant-purchase projects in Malindi, Lamu, Voi, Kwale and Kilifi towns to meet the surging housing demand. However, the experiences with most of these schemes have been below expectations. Finally, newer housing policies such as site-and-service schemes, settlement upgrading and the promising model of community land trust are discussed.