UGANDA, Kampala | Real Muloodi News | A recent survey revealed that 78.3% of building structures in the 11 cities in the country do not comply with the required building standards.
According to the survey conducted by the National Building Review Board (NBRB) from June to July, only 22.7% comply with the Building Control Act. Most buildings had no approved plans, no building permits, and are not under the supervision of professionals, putting users’ lives at risk.
“We did the study on complete buildings and active sites under construction targeting 6,200 buildings. Only 5,642 were inspected, putting the finding at 91%, 3,333 were active sites, while 2,606 were complete buildings,” the survey states.
The survey focused more on approved plans, building permits, professional engagement/supervision, and a drainage system.
“The overall compliance level of the active construction sites was at 19.5%, acquisition of a building permit at 6%, supervision of the building by professionals 6%,” the report states.
While releasing the findings, the NBRB executive secretary, Ms Flavia Bwire, said the survey aimed at ensuring that people comply with the standards of construction.
“The major challenge during the exercise included loss of time because of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially the mobility challenges and resistance by some respondents to provide the required information,” Ms Flavia said.
The findings show that among the new cities, Hoima was the best in both complete and active sites with 30.2%, followed by Mbarara with 29%. The worst cities include Lira, which had 9.7% and Arua with 13.9%.
The NBRB manager of compliance, Mr Timothy Mubbala, said they will present buildings violating standards to relevant committees for action.
Engineer Flavia also assured the public of the board’s commitment to control building operations with the established legal framework.
NBRB is a government agency under the Ministry of Works and Transport mandated to ensure the implementation of the Building Act 2013, merge and harmonise laws relating to the erection of buildings that follow building standards, plus promote and ensure planned, decent and safe building structures in the country.
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