Residents of Kangondo and Kibiraro are poised for a windfall as the government moves to compensate them to pave the way for their relocation.

According to the plan, residents whose houses are valued at more than Rwf35 million will be given money while others will be given houses in other places after they declined to relocate to Busanza.

In the highly contested exercise, over the past three weeks, several families residing in Bannyahe slums have all been relocated to Busanza. This follows heavy deployment of security personnel at the settlement in the past two weeks, which forced even those who had sworn not to leave, to vacate the place.

Among the more than 800 families that had refused to leave, only those with houses valued at more than Rwf35 million are still in the settlement, the rest have been moved.

The cacophony of noise that came from the place has been replaced by silence while the land that used to host close to 2000 families is now filled with piles of rubble after most of the houses were demolished by caterpillars.

Trucks have spent the past few weeks transporting families and their household items to the condominium estate in Busanza, 20 kilometers away from Bannyahe.

The families that were renting houses in the demolished settlement have also got houses to rent in different parts of the city, those that could not find a house or manage to raise quick money to rent the new houses were also facilitated by authorities.

At the condominium estate in Busanza, the newly relocated families -those that came at their own will and those that were relocated by force, are all doing their best to cope with the new realities. Teenage members of the estate are seen playing volleyball on one of the courts while others play basketball near the courtyard.

For Nyiransabimana Beatrice, the house she was relocated to is an upgrade compared with the dilapidated one she had in Kangondo.

“I was always repairing the house, it was in a sorry state and I am glad I was relocated here, for me it is a far better deal,”

“This place is not as bad as people say, besides having secure houses with utilities like water and electricity, schools, transport services are near, we even have a market just outside the estate”

Her house in Kangondo was valued at Rwf3 million, and the house she was compensated with in Busanza is valued at Rwf15million. Nyiransabimana is among the few that benefited from the transition, but it is not the case with those that owned property far more valuable compared to the houses they were compensated with.

The sentiment is different with Sekamana Francois (Not real names) a father of four, who says this transition has set the fortunes of his family many years back.

“Given the value of the property I had in Kangondo I was supposed to at least be given a house of three bedrooms, but I got one with one bedroom, my family can’t even fit into this house, I had to get rid of the maid."