Siphakeme .Mnindwa
Nqobile Tshili, nqobile.tshili@chronicle.co.zw
THE Bulawayo City Council (BCC) allocates approximately US$700 000 annually to its road rehabilitation programmes. Given the extensive scope of road maintenance work, the local authority engages private sector contractors to complement its own efforts, a council official has revealed
While 70 percent of the city’s roads have outlived their lifespan, limited resources prevent the council from fully reconstructing most of them. Instead, the local authority has resolved to conduct periodic maintenance to keep the roads trafficable. In recent months, the council has been patching some of the city’s major roads.
Responding to questions, Bulawayo communication officer, Ms Bongiwe Ngwenya, said the council covered a total of 3 000 square metres of pothole patching this year at a cost of nearly US$700 000. Contractors hired for the current year have completed the scope of works for 2024, which totalled 3 000 square metres citywide.
“We will engage contractors again for pothole patching during the first quarter of 2025 through an open tender system. The pothole patching programme will continue using both the council’s in-house teams and private contractors’ year on year until the council’s road maintenance teams are fully resourced.
“We normally give the contractors the scope in terms of the area to be covered in patching and the budget varies. The average annual budget for patching is about US$600 000 to US$700 000,” said Ms Ngwenya.
She explained that the council resolved to hire private contractors as it cannot rehabilitate the city’s roads on its own.
Ms Ngwenya said the council outsources equipment from five contractors, while two others are involved in road maintenance.
“The City of Bulawayo outsources or subcontracts road maintenance activities and plant and equipment to augment council resources (i.e., plant, equipment, labour). The council on its own does not have the capacity to undertake all road maintenance activities citywide. The council has been outsourcing pothole patching for years. For the year 2024, the council outsourced pothole patching to two companies and hired plant and equipment from more than five companies,” said Ms Ngwenya.
She revealed that the city implements a periodic road maintenance programme, which includes reconstruction, overlays, reseals and road markings, as well as routine maintenance works such as pothole patching and drain clearing.
“The budget allocation split is 75 percent to periodic works and 25 percent to routine maintenance works,” she said.
Meanwhile, a local construction company has patched potholes along Khami Road to Emthunzini suburb on the outskirts of the city as a donation. Over the past few weeks, workers from Hawkflight Construction have been patching potholes on the section of Khami Road, while road markings have also been done on the same road.
“The current works on patching the carriageway on Khami Road from Emthunzini Suburb towards the city centre is a donation. The works are carried out at no cost to the council,” she said.
By October this year, the Zimbabwe National Roads Administration (Zinara) had disbursed over ZWG 13 million to Bulawayo for road rehabilitation. — @nqotshili
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