Turkey to begin building houses for İzmir earthquake victims in a month

ANKARA

Turkey will begin constructing houses in a month to be donated to the victims who lost their homes in a major earthquake that hit the western province of İzmir for which around 1.5 million square meters of reserve area has been allocated, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said.

“The removal of debris will be completed as soon as possible. We will start the construction of the houses in a month. We will give these houses to the beneficiaries before the end of the next year. This is our road map,” Erdoğan told a meeting of the Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) provincial heads in Ankara on Nov. 5.

İzmir, Turkey’s third-largest city by population, was struck by a magnitude 6.6 earthquake on Oct. 30, which resulted in the collapse of dozens of multistory buildings, killing 114 and injuring 1,035 people.

The people living in the buildings that collapsed due to the earthquake will be given shelter in 1,000 container-houses until their new houses are built, Erdoğan said.

The Environment and Urbanization Ministry will soon begin the construction of the houses on the designated area as the ground studies have been completed, Erdoğan informed, stressing that the government’s urban transformation project is also continuing across the country.

“We are planning to build 1.5 million houses within five years,” he said, citing the works by the state housing authority, TOKI, which have built 975,000 houses during the 18-year rule of the AKP.

“It’s a very big revolution. This move, supported by the efforts of the private sector, has yielded an important transformation in our country. But we still have 6.7 million houses that need to be transformed,” he added.

The president recalled that Turkey sits on multiple active fault lines and has suffered from many earthquakes in the past, stressing that the government will continue its works for earthquake-proof cities and residential areas through the continued urban transformation projects.