ONGWEDIVA - The Ongwediva Town Council has awarded a tender to upgrade the town’s Church Street to bitumen standard to Emirates Trading.

The N$6.3 million contract was initially awarded to Neu Olulya Trading last November.

However, the contractor failed to deliver and abandoned the site, prompting council to cancel the tender earlier this year.

Ongwediva Town Council spokesperson Jackson Muma explained that the tender was awarded to Emirates in September, and is expected to be completed in eight months.

He said the initial contractor only managed to set out the area before they abandoned it.

“They had just started to set out, excavated the area, and stopped along the way. Thus, council decided to terminate their work for non-performance,” he added.

The 1.6km stretch runs across the Abraham Nyambali and Kahumba Kandola streets.

Muma said although the project was initially expected to be completed this year, with the new extension, the upgrade is only due for completion in May next year.

He thus appealed to residents residing in extensions 6 to 8 to cooperate with the contractor so that the work can be completed as scheduled.

“The public will experience restricted movements during the period of construction, but we appeal with them to be patient,” he stated.

Muma assured residents council is working around the clock to ensure they have access to basic services, including roads.

“This is the only road we are upgrading at the moment. We take one road at a time. When we finished tarring the road behind Mweshipandeka to the Select service station, we moved to this one,” he continued.

- nashipala@nepc.com.na