About ¼ of the world’s total population are slum dwellers in our cities, and it is irrespective of the country or continent. Some cities even have more than half of their population to be slum dwellers. With this rising menace, where are the biggest slums in the world located? Let’s take a peek:
1. Khayelitsha, Cape Town, South Africa
Right in the capital of South Africa, these huge slum houses about 400,000 residents, 99% of which are black. The condition is so worse that not less than 12,000 households have no access to toilets. Unbelievable, right?
2. Kibera, Nairobi, Kenya
Kibera is the largest slum in Africa and is located right in Nairobi, Kenya at about 5km from the city center. It has a population of 700, 000; 50, 000 of which are made up of children who go to residential and religious informal schools for western education. Residents had to fight tooth and nails in a court of law to stop the government from building a road through Kibera, thereby bulldozing schools, clinics and thousands of homes.
3. Dharavi, Mumbai, India
Slumdog Millionaire was filmed right in this slum which is home to several small-scale businesses and boasts of an informal economy valued at $1 billion annual turnovers.
There have been several attempts to develop the slum as it sits on a prime estate with strongholds on India’s financial strength. It has a population of 1 million dwellers.
4. Ciudad Neza, Mexico City, Mexico
This now improved slum was once a sprawling slum. The developments are purely it residents’ effort towards community living and public service. It has a population of 1.2 million and is still widely reputed for crimes.
5. Orangi Town, Karachi, Pakistan
This is the largest slum in Asia and the world entirely with a population not less than 2.4 million dwellers. In their quest for clean living, the residents built their sewage systems by hand after several years of waiting for the government. This has led to a cleaner community has about 8,000 streets, and lanes in the dwelling have sewage pipes installed by residents.
