2018-06-18Staff Report 2 John Muyamba RUNDU - Roads Authority (RA) CEO, Conrad Lutombi has informed Kavango East Regional Governor Dr. Samuel Mbambo about RA’s five-year strategic plan to build roads. The five-year strategic plan was recently unveiled by Minister of Works and Transport, John Mutorwa. Lutombi visited Mbambo last Thursday. “We felt that it would be important for us to come and brief you on our five-year strategic plan, as far as Kavango East is concerned,” said Lutombi whose parastatal is in charge of the maintenance and development of Namibian roads. “We have recently developed a five-year strategic plan which was launched by our minister John Mutorwa, therefore, we are now in the process of rolling out this strategy and it is imperative for us to share this strategy with our key stakeholders,” he said. Lutombi said RA’s strategic plan involved main projects in Kavango East, such as the widening of the Divundu Bridge, which was completed. They also constructed Chova/Divayi gravel road, Kaisosi and Cuma gravel road among other maintenance programs carried out. “Moving forward into the next five years, we have taken the medium to long-term strategy of our medium to long-term Road Master Plan, which comes from the deliberation priorities from the roads board were regional councillors also participated and this has been chaired by our line ministry. We included those priorities into our strategy, taking into account the resources to implement these projects,” he said. Lutombi said the first priority in terms of their plan for the next five years is to rehabilitate the Rundu - Divundu road that is part of the Trans-Zambezi Highway. They will then also upgrade to bitumen standard a remaining section of the Divundu to Muhembo border post gravel road. “We are also going to carry out a feasibility study of upgrading to bitumen standard the Ndonga Linena-Ncaute gravel which connects to Sikanduko in Rundu, about 156 km. With that, we also prioritise the upgrade of the gravel from Ncuncuni to Cuma until Mbambi village, the idea is that in future, we will also be able to link Cuma to Kaisosi through an upgraded road, which will provide access into the inner land villages and farms,” elaborated the RA chief. The key road for construction for gravel roads is the Mungunda – Shakambu, which is about 37 km, on this, RA is already done with the designs and they will soon be going for construction. “These are our key areas of focus in the next five years, however, we are also aware that there are other priorities to link some of the farmers, especially roads like Mutwe to Mbahe, Vicota, Cuma and Ndiyona which links to Khaudum National Park and Mukuni which links to Trans-Kalahari, and then we have Mayongora road which basically is an extension of the Chally cutline from Alex Muranda which will link all the way up to Livayi,” he further narrated. “Depending on issues on the ground, some priorities can change. Thank you for your efforts and your strategic leadership in particular when it comes to road infrastructure, and with the media briefing you had on the Ndonga Linena demining, we would want to assure you that when the demining is done, that road will be taken care of as we are talking now, we have completed the planning of that road,” concluded Lutombi. 2018-06-18Staff Report 2
