30 Mar 2022

The Francistown City Council continues to prioritise maintenance of road infrastructure network in areas that are in a critical state. 

Addressing full Council meeting on Monday, Mayor Godisang Radisigo said most roads within the city were in a bad state, hence reconstruction of 1 km Molapo access road and spot improvement at Light Industrial, funded under the road levy. He said the tender for Molapo reconstruction was awarded in 2019 and was to be completed in February this year. 

The project is at 70 percent and was largely delayed due to unreliable suppliers. Meanwhile, Mr Radisigo said that the council had been fortunate to secure P18 million for maintenance of roads under development funding and P10 million under the Road Levy Fund for the 2022/23 financial year. He noted that P18 million would be used for asphalt overlay of 8km of roads within CBD, resealing about 2km in CBD and pothole patching in various places within the City of Francistown. 

On the other hand, the mayor said P10 million would cover asphalt overlay of 2.8 km at CBD, street lighting at Selepa along Chibudzane Street and tower lights at Blocks 1 and 2, Monarch and Phase 6. 

Regarding maintenance of primary schools, he said “in the 2020/21 fiscal year, an amount of more than P2.8 million was approved to carry out maintenance of Ikhutseng Primary School academic facilities and the tender was re advertised in November 2021 after an appeal,” adding that unfortunately it had been appealed yet again. 

In a similar incident, in 2021/22 an amount of P5.3 million was approved by the ministry for maintenance of Phathogo Primary School and Ikhutseng Primary School staff houses and again there was an appeal that was registered, but has been dismissed and the award letter was issued on March 18 this year. 

He however said during the financial year 2020/21, the ministry approved the construction of a new fully-fledged primary school under the Economic Recovery and Transformation Plan (ERTP) with P2.5 million allocated for the design of the school, which comprised of Design Review, Environmental Management Plan (EMP) and the Geotechnical Services. 

The Design Review has been awarded whilst Geotechnical Services, EMP were complete and the construction of the 25 units of staff housing for the school has been awarded at a contract sum of more than P24.9 million. Regarding the water situation, Mr Radisigo said Water Utilities Corporation (WUC) was currently implementing a project meant to upgrade Shashe Sub Station to bring the power supply to the expected standard and also allow for the connection of standby generators that will reduce power interruption at the water treatment plant. 

“This will reduce water supply interruption to the city and surrounding areas in case of power cuts,” he said, adding that the project started in February this year and is expected to be completed this November. 

He encouraged water consumers to pay their water bills to avoid negative consequences and mostly to enable the corporation to deliver its mandate effectively. ends