The Resettlement process in the urban periphery of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Cities have changed dramatically in recent decades as a result of growth, infrastructural development, and increasing urbanization. This results in displacement and resettlement which is a multi-faceted process that necessitates the participation of a variety of parties. On a global scale, efforts have been made to provide international advice, exchange best practices, and valuable tools to bring inclusive planning and effectively implement resettlement. In Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, settlement underwent various modifications, resulting in the establishment of substandard housing and inadequately facilitated neighborhoods due to a lack of official city planning. As a result, currently, urban redevelopment become a common activity to enhance and develop the decade neighborhoods which is followed by resettlement in the urban periphery by building new governmental multi-story housing. The city government undertakes this urban land development without consulting neither the demographic dynamic nor considering current governance capacity which creates an uncoordinated distribution of services and insufficient localized economic activities in the provision of adequate housing. This research aims on explaining the influence of the governance of the resettlement process on the accessibility of adequate multi-story housing provision at the urban periphery of Addis Ababa. This research adopts the case study as a research strategy with a qualitative technique. A semi-structured interview is carried out with a respondent from stakeholders, community leaders and used an expert interview and secondary data to triangulate the information. The qualitative data were analyzed through co-occurrence analysis in Atlas Ti to explain the relationship between the governance of the resettlement process and accessibility of adequate housing. The study found out that, the resettlement process has four distinctive sub-process: urban renewal and redevelopment, implementation and construction of a condominium, allocation of condominium for relocatees, and Monitoring. In the governance of the resettlement process, the level of stakeholder involvement in terms of mobilization and social inclusion is an important factor in the Jemo condominium. The process had a top-down one-way communication /consultation engagement level due to the fact that the process is initiated by top authorities and there is a lack of collaboration and networking between the stakeholders, as well as the relocatees community, which led to delay in the provision of infrastructure and service. Moreover, the clear role and responsibilities assignment for the governmental institutes enables the stakeholders in the process while the lack of openness in the process constrains the social inclusion which influences the accessibility to adequate housing.