The Housing Dilemma

One of the main duties of any government is to provide infrastructure services to its citizens at a level that responds to their actual needs. Of these services is housing, which represents the most important for all citizens.

  In a small country like Bahrain, land that can be allocated for such projects is usually scarce. Housing projects are therefore on the top of the agenda for any government that senses the difficulties of providing housing.

With the rising cost of land and building construction, more people are becoming unable to buy land or build their houses relying on their own income alone. In situations like this, government intervention and role in providing this important service becomes essential. However, the policies of the Government of Bahrain are contrary to this fact. There is a clear absence of recognition of the importance of housing.

While the Government spends hundreds of millions of Dollars to provide services for private investment projects, the housing projects which are supposed to serve the citizens are moving at a very slow pace. Moreover, the Northern Town project, which was intended to mitigate the housing problem in the country, is behind schedule by months, and a great percentage of the project has either been allocated to members of the ruling family or sold to private investors. At the same time, many of the lands available elsewhere in the country are confiscated by members of the ruling family and stamped as “Royal Property”.

Political naturalization has also forced the government to allocate many of the housing units to those who came from different counties, while the indigenous citizens remain on the waiting list, sometimes for more than 15 years. Injustice went steps further by taking back keys from a number of Bahrainis who were recently allocated their houses after 16 years of being on the waiting list.

With no near hope of sorting out these problems, such practices give clear examples of the agony the citizens of Bahrain are forced to go through, and the dilemma they have to live in. While this agony continues, so do the attempts to confiscate whatever remains pulbic land, thus eliminating any hopes of easement for the citizens in the near future.

Bahrain Freedom Movement
3rd November 2008