Arusha Municipality will finally be upgraded to a city after a seven-year wait for the coveted and prestigious status, this week.

Arusha

President Jakaya Kikwete is expected to officially confer the status by unveiling the new ‘City Emblem’ at the Arusha Declaration Museum grounds on Thursday, the 1st of November, this year.

The Head of State is also expected to lay a foundation stone at the ‘Florida’ roundabout along Col. Middleton Road. The Public Relations Officer for the Arusha Municipality, Ms Ntengenjwa Hosea, said the ultimate ceremony to mark the occasion will be staged at Sheikh Amri Abeid Stadium on the same date and this will involve the general public, mostly the town’s residents.

“The president will also inaugurate the ongoing construction of roads and street refurbishments in the town,” said Ms Hosea. Effective from the 2nd of November 2012, therefore, Arusha is going to become Tanzania’s 5th city after Dar es Salaam, Mwanza, Tanga and Mbeya.

Arusha, however, ranks second to Dar, when it comes to revenue collection, beating the other three cities. Arusha which came into being in 1900 was declared a township in 1948 and became a Municipality in 1980. It was placed on fast track onto becoming a city on the 1st of July 2005, but the highest urban status was placed on hold pending some adjustments to the town’s topography.

The conditions were that the Municipality must upgrade and improve its infrastructure and expand its mapped area in order to boost population as well as ‘killing off’ 11 villages that were existing within the precinct, by upgrading them into either wards or streets.

The 2002 Population and Housing Census indicated that the town centre population on any particular night remained just above 280,000 though this figure was raised to 320,000 in the 2008 estimates.

Source Tanzania Daily News