The Public Rental Board is aiming to move 118 tenants from rental homes to homeownership.

This is after it identified that they were no longer eligible to rent in the estates because they had exceeded the income threshold.

To qualify to rent in the Raiwai Flats, household income should be less than $25,000 while for the rest the board’s estates this should be less than $16,500.

Board acting general manager Patrick Veu said they had identified such tenants in their various estates in the Central, Northern and Western division outside of the Raiwai flats.

He said there were various reasons these people crossed the income threshold for tenancy at the PRB flats.

He said better employment or more family members working was one of them.

Mr Veu said talks were underway with the Housing Authority of Fiji to secure land and homeownership for them.

Future developments

He also added that the board was looking at future developments because it had been able to secure land.

“The land within our current estates have all been occupied,” Mr Veu said.

“In Raiwai and McFarlane Road, we identified open space and we have built there, all these are congested and we are thankful to Housing Authority who have allocated us space in Davuilevu around five acres and two and a half acres in Tavakubu in Lautoka.

“We are talking to the Lands Department.

“We met the Permanent Secretary of Lands and they have offered us five sites. They are working on the leases.

“This would be either freehold or crown leases. We have been lucky because this will not be very costly to us.”

The four-storey buildings in Raiwaqa were demolished almost a decade ago. The site still remains.

The board is working on ways to develop a public-private partnership.

“For the ex-Raiwaqa site, we are talking to Government and to the International Finance Corporation, to help us in a private-public partnership. Details of it is that someone builds it, runs it for a while and hand it over to us,” Mr Veu said.

The board manages 16 estates in Suva, Nasinu, Lautoka, Nadi, Labasa and Savusavu.

Edited by Ranoba Baoa

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