Cities tend to change not through sweeping root-and- branch transformations but by individual neighbourhoods reinventing themselves. Not so in Nigeria’s bustling oil hub Port Harcourt, where things are so bad that the only eff ective approach is holistic. Port Harcourt’s two million resilient residents live among an ever- expanding chaos of non-existent town planning, impromptu waste dumps, power outages and traffi c jams. Rather than thriving in its role as gatekeeper to Africa’s biggest oil reserves in the swampy Niger Delta, Port Harcourt has gone to pot. But now, in a renaissance that has been encouraged by the enduring stability in a region long stymied by militancy, Nigeria’s second richest city is being rebuilt brick by brick, block by block.

The Greater Port Harcourt City Development Authority is in charge of the overhaul. Established in 2009, the authority has drawn up plans with South African engineering consultancy Arcus GIBB for phased developments that will modernise the old town and create a new city from scratch. To fund the initial stages, Rivers State’s governor Rotimi Amaechi has pledged $1bn over the next four years, and will match this through a 250 billion naira ($1.6bn) bond issue.

Basic infrastructure for a new city stretching south from the airport and north from the existing old town has already gone down. Here a mixed- use development will allow people to live alongside their work and leisure, combining 350,000 new homes with a central business district and services including shopping malls, schools, a hospital, a science-and-technology university and a sports precinct with playing fields. The hope is that many of the big oil and gas groups that relocated their staff to Lagos during the militancy will start to return. Nigeria LNG has already announced plans to move its HQ from Lagos to purpose-built offi ces here and once the big companies come back, other support services will follow.

The new city may be an opportunity for Harcourtians to start from scratch but the plans put as much emphasis on rejuvenating the existing city. “We have focused just as much on the old city,” says engineering consultant Johan de Bruyn, who peppers his speech with cosmetic surgery terms such as uplift, link and reprofile. Here the idea is to link the government precinct and old town with the waterfront and make more of Port Harcourt’s creeks and rivers, creating a tourist district with hotels, a cinema, cafés, restaurants and shops. Again, the infrastructure is going in first. New roads, sewage and water systems have temporarily added to the chaos. “It’s a building site,” says Ike Tokunboh, a hotelier in the government precinct. A monorail, a ring road and a highway to the airport are also in the offi ng.

Rejuvenating the waterfront has been controversial. The authorities are clearing sprawling shanty neighbourhoods such as Bundu and Njemanze that stretch  
1.5km along the waterfront’s polluted shoreline and estuaries. The federal government argues that the area is unsafe and prone to flooding, and that the shanties shelter local militant groups – however, the quarrel has an ethnic hue as well. Many of the residents are of a different ethnic group to Rivers State’s governor and residents say they are being given no compensation or alternative accommodation.

The project could also slip on Nigeria’s political terrain. Incumbent governor Amaechi’s term could end in the 2015 elections, at which point only an estimated 60% of the construction will be finished. Rivers State’s oil-producing neighbour, Cross River State, embarked on a similar project when its governor Donald Duke set about constructing a new city outside the state capital of Calabar. Tinapa Resort hasn’t attracted the visitor numbers, many of the shops stand empty and Cross River is saddled with the construction debts it guaranteed.

Tinapa is a white elephant because it was never an integrated project, says Tokunboh, whose enthusiasm above the din of roadworks reflects the new, buoyant mood gripping Port Harcourt.

He says the rejuvenation promises opportunities for wealthy Harcourtians to spend their money. At the moment, most whisk it out and cities such as Lagos, Abuja, Dubai and London benefit. “Soon it will be our turn,” he says. Sarah Rundell