Government hopes to soon make some announcements regarding the availability of affordable housing for ordinary Fijians very soon.

Attorney-General and Minister for Finance, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, stressed housing is a big issue for the Government and an area they are tapping into now.

“We are working on affordable housing to ensure we have development in that area,” he said.

Meanwhile, Assistant Minister for Local Government, Housing and Environment, Lorna Eden, confirmed the Ministry is working with the Housing Authority on a project.

This will be setting up small satellite townships.

She said they are passionate about this and believe it will alleviate squatter problems in the urban areas.

Through these satellite townships, Ms Eden said they want to shift those in squatter areas to a place where there is something attractive enough for them to go for.

“So what we are thinking of doing is setting up these little satellite townships that will have shops, schools and job employment for them,” she said.

“We hoping to get this off the ground sooner rather than later and hopefully alleviate the squatter problems.”

Tackling issues

Meanwhile, Mr Sayed-Khaiyum has acknowledged that there is a need to make residential properties more affordable.

This follows a question on Saturday during the Fiji Business Forum over the cost of properties.

Mr Sayed-Khaiyum said this was s big problem and squatter problem was a part of it as well.

He told the business community that there must be so many of their staff members, some even employed at banks, who are living in squatters.

“You don’t realise that but that is the reality in Fiji, in particular in Suva-Nausori corridor. That is what we need to fix,” he said.

“Housing is a major priority for us. If we can get that right, get a few projects on, then perhaps we can look to slowly liberalise the market.”

He said there are a lot of dangers in the industry and they do not want to force people to go into squatter areas as a result of pricing.

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