The Epworth Master Plan: Forging Order from Disorder
By Kudzai Jakachira
For decades, Epworth has existed as a testament to indomitable, if weathered, resilience.
Perched upon the dusty periphery of Harare, it has functioned as a sanctuary for the weary and a makeshift harbor for the marginalized.
Yet, beneath this veneer of survivalism, a silent, corrosive rot has been metastasizing.
What began as a settlement of necessity has devolved into a labyrinthine sprawl of “informality”—a sanitized sociological euphemism for a desperate, chaotic scramble for the very earth beneath one’s feet.
Today, Epworth stands at a precarious threshold.
The prevailing land shortage is no longer a mere administrative hurdle; it is a systemic failure threatening to cannibalize the town’s social fabric, economic potential, and ecological future.
The 2024–2040 Epworth Master Plan is, therefore, far more than a document of urban design.
It represents a high-stakes intervention—a final opportunity to transition from a disorganized collection of dwellings into a coherent, modernized urban center.
To ignore its mandates is to consign Epworth to a permanent state of arrested development.
In the anatomy of a thriving metropolis, land functions as the connective tissue—the site of commerce, the theater of recreation, and the sanctuary of the spirit.
In Epworth, this tissue is being severed. The most tragic casualty of this unchecked encroachment is the youth.
The Olympiafrica Stadium, once envisioned as a beacon of athletic excellence, remains a ghost on a blueprint, its earmarked soil swallowed by a tide of illegal settlements.
Dr. Wilton Mhanda, Town Secretary for the Epworth Local Board, underscores the existential nature of this transition. “The implementation of this Master Plan represents a landmark achievement in formalizing what was once an informal settlement—a transition that is pivotal as we stand on the precipice of attaining full town status,” Mhanda asserts.
He warns that the loss of communal space triggers a darker metamorphosis: “When recreational spaces are surrendered to the sprawl, the ‘third spaces’—those vital arenas outside of home and work where community identity is forged—evaporate.”
In their wake, a social vacuum emerges, frequently filled by the predatory impulses of a disenfranchised generation.
The crisis extends into the realm of economic sovereignty, which requires the rigid enforcement of zoning laws. Currently, Epworth’s industrial heart is being strangled in its cradle.
Informal dwellings have infiltrated zones designated for manufacturing, creating a volatile “land-use conflict” that frightens away capital.
”By providing the legal and structural certainty of a formally planned map, the local board aims to reassure investors who have previously been deterred by the risk of property demolitions,” Dr. Mhanda explains.
He is uncompromising regarding the stakes: “Investors do not build on shifting sands. When industrial land is invaded, the promise of local employment—the very engine required to hoist families out of generational poverty—is extinguished.”
Perhaps the most haunting indictment of this informality is the looming cemetery crisis.
The unplanned expansion has been so relentless that the town has effectively run out of room to bury its dead.
When a community can no longer find six feet of earth to inter a loved one, it enters a state of profound psychological distress. It is a grim.Malthusian reality: in a city without a plan, the living eventually crowd out the space for the dead,”
Ecologically, the trajectory is equally dire. The Master Plan identifies wetland encroachment as the primary challenge to the town’s longevity.
Wetlands are the biological kidneys of the landscape; as informal settlements pave over these ecosystems, natural water management is obliterated.
”From an environmental perspective, the current trajectory is nothing short of suicidal,” Dr. Mhanda remarks.
He further emphasizes that standardized infrastructure is the only remedy. “The risk of environmental disasters would be curtailed through the establishment of robust drainage systems and systematic urban planning. Without the planned infrastructure of storm drains and retaining walls, every rainfall becomes a localized disaster, choking waterways with sediment and contaminating the groundwater that thousands rely on.”
The 2024–2040 Master Plan proposes a radical restructuring based on vertical density and the expansion of administrative boundaries to create a regulated buffer against chaos.
However, the Local Board must navigate the delicate reality that many in these “at-risk” zones are the most vulnerable. Empathy must be balanced with the cold necessity of the law.
”If the Master Plan is not executed with clinical precision and political will, Epworth will devolve into an unlivable wasteland of environmental decay and social fragmentation,” Dr. Mhanda concludes. “This is the final battle for the heart of the town. It is a battle between the chaos of the past and the order of the future—and it is a battle that Epworth cannot afford to lose.”
