Regional roads authorities to trap dishonest firms
UNRA executive director, Ms Allen Kagina, said the alliance was conceived against the backdrop of all the roads authorities experiencing similar challenges and opportunities which can be jointly addressed and tapped into, respectively. File photo
KAMPALA. The chief executive officers of regional roads authorities yesterday met in Kampala to devise new efforts to trap deceitful construction firms.
The inaugural summit of the Eastern Africa Regional Roads Authorities also put signature to a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) establishing a forum through which the roads bodies of Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, South Sudan, Ethiopia and Rwanda will collaborate on other matters of mutual interest.
The Uganda National Roads Authority (Unra) executive director, Ms Allen Kagina, said the alliance was conceived against the backdrop of all the roads authorities experiencing similar challenges and opportunities which can be jointly addressed and tapped into, respectively.
Regional challenges
Some of the challenges that cut across include; inadequate funding, over reliance of development aid, wily contractors and overloading leading to destruction of roads within a short time.
“Our coming together could not be timelier,” Ms Kagina said. “The foundation we build now will determine the strength of our forum working with our shared goals and given mandates.”
The summit was attended by the director general of the Kenya National Highway Authority (Kenha) Peter Mudinia and the director general of the Tanzania Roads agency (Tanroads) Patrick Mfugale, who respectively were accompanied by several officials in the chain. The executives of South Sudan, Rwanda and Ethiopia, did not attend.
The alliance
The new forum will also build onto the network of already existing forums and frameworks such as the Northern Corridor Transit and Transport Coordination Authority, the Central Corridor Transit and Transport Facilitation Agency and the Association of Southern African National Roads Agency.
The Eastern Africa region with a combined road paved network of less than 50,000km and serving a joined population of 290 million; Ms Kagina said is a huge test which calls for more and such concerted efforts to boost the network to be able to facilitate intra-regional trade. The forum, she underscored, will also be used to checking on fraudulent practices in procurement processes and poor performing contractors who seek work in all countries.
Tanzania, the biggest East African country, has a road network of about 86,472km and a hub for international highway such as the Cairo-Cape Town highway, Highway 4 in the Trans-African Highway network that runs between the northern town of Namanga on the Kenyan border and the Zambian border town of Tunduma in the southwest, via Arusha, and Dodoma.with the necessary resources.
