The Oshikoto Regional Council has spent N$40 million on infrastructure development for the 2022/23 financial year.
This was revealed by governor Penda Ya Ndakolo during his state of the regional address at Omuthiya on Wednesday.
He said the regional council budgeted a total of N$46 million towards infrastructure development, of which N$40 million was spent, accounting for an 88% execution rate.
Ya Ndakolo said the development focused on the provision of clean drinking water, electrification of rural areas, settlements and growth centres, surveying of settlements, implementation of the sanitation programmes, and the construction of roads and offices.
He further highlighted that during the year under-review, the region budgeted for 17 areas to be electrified, of which seven were fully electrified with medium and low voltage networks, noting the other 10 are in progress and the majority of them are above 80% progress rate.
“Infrastructure development is important as it does not only ensure the provision of critical goods and services to the communities, but it also provides the much needed employment through tenders awarded, especially to private companies,” he noted.
Ya Ndakolo noted that the region continues to face water scarcity challenges, especially in the deep rural areas, where pressure is low or water is salty. However, despite those challenges, the regional leadership is fully conscious of the responsibility they bear to mitigate them.
He indicated that the division of rural water supply conducted experimental interventions towards the water challenge by digging five deep boreholes at an amount of N$4 million in the rural constituencies which are historically prone to saline underground water, however, it was found that none of the five boreholes were safe for human and animal consumption.
“In order to cleanse the water and make it suitable for consumption, the division is currently busy implementing the desalination process,” he noted.
He revealed that the Namibia Water Corporation (NamWater) is working on the environmental impact assessment study for the Ondangwa Omutsegwonime water-pipeline replacement phase-one, which is budgeted at N$80 million as well as the Oshivelo-Omutsegwonime water supply scheme, which is at the initiation phase and budgeted at N$27 million. – Nampa