The Minister for Urban and Rural Development, Erastus Uutoni, has urged leaders to set aside their political differences and prioritise timely service delivery and development.
Speaking at the ground-breaking ceremony for new houses at Bukalo, Uutoni highlighted that internal conflicts among leaders hinder development, leading residents to blame the government.
To the leadership of the village council Bukalo village council has been idle in terms of development for some time. Why, why has it been idle? Fighting one another, and you know it, my dear parents, my dear brothers, my dear sisters, my dear family members, why do we have to fight one another?"
Uutoni welcomed the project as a beacon of hope for the town's development, appealing to the developers and housing contractors to consider the needs of low income groups.
"You know, the developers want to generate a quick income, and they focus more on those who are at least earning high and forget those at the lower level, so what I'm trying to say is, please, when you come to develop in an area, you should also look at the lower income group of a society, so that they can also benefit."
The housing development, undertaken by Oasis Learning Training and Haamco Investment, aims to construct 162 houses on a 15-hectare piece of land provided by the Bukalo Village Council.
The developers will bear the cost of land servicing, which includes renovating the sports complex and community hall as part of their corporate social responsibilities.
The Zambezi Governor, Lawrence Sampofu, emphasised that the new development should not become another abandoned or rushed project.
"We urge you to make sure that you build houses, and these houses you take care of and value for money for those buying them. We have seen other areas; in these houses, after 3 months, things are already falling apart. Value for money is very important. We want to see these houses finished, we had a developer here some time back, houses we left, some of the houses were left half-done, we don't want to see half-done houses, we want to see full houses."
The development project will be carried out in three phases.
The first phase involves constructing 162 houses, followed by the construction of a service station in the second phase and ultimately a shopping mall in the third phase.