The Sunday Mail
THE Zimbabwe National Road Administration (Zinara) failed to complete the dualisation of the Harare International Airport Road on December 31, 2014 as expected. Citizens in general and motorists in particular believe that the administration in sleeping on the wheel. In June last year, Zinara took over the project, which started six years ago, from the Harare City Council (HCC). Apparently, HCC had contracted Augur Investments for the works, but failure to raise sufficient funds derailed the venture.
Initially, the project was valued at US$80 million, but this has since been revised downwards to US$60 million.
Last week, our business reporter AFRICA MOYO caught up with Zinara board chairman Mr Albert Mugabe to get an insight into how far the project has progressed.
Q: Zinara has missed the target to complete phase one of the dualisation of Airport Road. What caused this?
A: The permanent secretary (Mr Munesu Munodawafa) set a target for us to complete phase one (of the project) by end of March 2015. However, the board, realising the importance of the road, set itself a shorter timeline hence the much publicised December 31st deadline.
Q: So you have actually missed your own timeline?
A. Technically, no. Zinara has not missed its timeline.
Q: But the road is not complete.
A. Zinara does not fix roads. Zinara provides funding for road maintenance, rehabilitation and construction. We availed funding to complete phase one; so, technically, we executed our mandate to expectation within the asphyxiating timeframe that we set for ourselves.
Q: So why is the road not done?
A: The onset of rains has affected work on the ground. Some processes, especially earthworks that involve the construction of pavement layers, are difficult to execute under the prevailing wet conditions. Rains tend to increase the moisture content in both the in-situ soil and the imported gravel hence it will be difficult to achieve the required densities during compaction. However, even before the rains started, delays were experienced due to the relocation of municipal sewerage pipes and Zesa’s power cables.
Q: But we have seen roads being constructed in other countries where the rain does not stop.
A: That’s correct. Rain itself is not the limiting factor; it’s a question of the type of road being constructed. In countries that experience frequent rains they mostly construct their roads using reinforced concrete slabs, which, in engineering terms, is called a rigid pavement, and this type of road can be constructed in both dry and wet conditions. The pavement type that is currently being constructed on Airport Road is a flexible pavement which ideally is best done under dry conditions. In Zimbabwe, we generally use flexible pavements to construct our roads except in exceptional cases. An example is in 2013 during UNWTO, (the) DOR (department of roads) constructed a one kilometre reinforced concrete rigid pavement between Victoria Falls Border and Victoria Falls bridge because that area is affected by the rain forest, where wet conditions prevail on that section of road throughout the year.
Q: But when you awarded the tender you should have foreseen that.
A: The rear view mirror is often clearer than the windscreen. Nonetheless, in this instance, there is need to contextualise this project. This project was not a planned project. We embarked on it following an executive decision. Government’s instruction to us was to immediately attend to road-works on Airport Road and complete the project as soon as possible. This project had no budgetary allocation. We need to keep it in mind that this project had been under construction for many years. What we have accomplished is extraordinary. When we took over, no one had foreseen that we would execute well over 90 percent of phase one in just six months. This is further demonstration of the reinvigorated Zinara that I have spoken of before. The Zinara board has made some drastic mind-set changes in the Zinara psyche and our motoring public will soon witness the positive results of the trajectory that the board has taken.
Q. You still have not answered the question, why was it not foreseen?
A. If financing had been availed to the contractors at inception of the project, we would have completed phase one. However, we had to ‘‘drip-finance’’ the project because it was not in our budget; thereby, affecting the pace of road-works. Remarkably, we have managed to inject over US$5,2 million into this project. It could not be foreseen because we encountered challenges beyond our control such as the relocation of services that I have already alluded to. So, why make a tight target in the first place, you may ask? A lethargic reaction to this urgent and important link could not be tolerated under Government’s drive to make parastatals and Government entities efficient and effective. The deadline was therefore overly ambitious but necessary to effect a discernible impact and ultimately complete works in the shortest possible time. Ambitious targets are key enablers to fulfilling ZimAsset.
