Govt applauds Masaka City leaders on USMID road works
Mr Isaac Mutenyo (middle), the national coordinator USMID project and members of the project technical committee inspect some of the roads under construction in Masaka City on Saturday. PHOTO | RICHARD KYANJO
What you need to know:
- According to Mr Isaac Mutenyo, the national coordinator USMID project, the seriousness exhibited by Masaka City leaders may form the basis for the city to benefit from another round of the project funds.
Government has commended leaders in Masaka City for keenly supervising the World Bank-funded road roads under Uganda Support to Municipal Infrastructure Development (USMID) programme which yielded impressive results.
According to Mr Isaac Mutenyo, the national coordinator USMID project, the seriousness exhibited by Masaka City leaders may form the basis for the city to benefit from another round of the project funds.
“We are impressed with the work, so far so good. If there was no close monitoring and supervision from leaders on the ground shoddy work could have manifested like it is the case in some other cities,” he said while inspecting the road works on Saturday.
Last year, Masaka City received an additional Shs60b from the World Bank to facilitate the construction of seven roads in the area including; Baines Terrace, Birch Avenue, Alexander Road, Hill Road, Circular Rise Road, Circular Rise and Barracks Road.
The project equally covers the street lighting of Nyendo-Kitovu Road, Speke Road, Villa Road, sections of Nyendo-Bukakkata Road, Masaka-Kampala Highway, Masaka-Mbarara highway and Masaka-Mutukula highway .
However, Mr Mutenyo tasked the contractor to remove sharp bends on some of the roads and also reconstruct perimeter walls which got damaged.
China WuYI Co Ltd was contracted to do the work which is nearing completion.
Mr Augustus Turibarungi, the Masaka City engineer, urged the government to swiftly release the remaining funds for the contractor whose contract is ending this month.
“We don’t want the contractor to finish work and start demanding money. He has been very patient and sometimes using his own money to speed up the work,” he said.
Previously, other roads including Yellow Knife Road, Edward Avenue, Jethabhai Street, Alex Ssebowa and Katwe were also revamped under the same programme.
The infrastructural development is a big boost to Masaka which was elevated to a city effective July 1, 2020.
Other new regional cities include; Mbale, Arua, Gulu, Jinja, Soroti, Lira, Fort Portal, Hoima and Mbarara.
The USMID project has also played a big role in improving infrastructure in many urban centres across the country.
Between 2013 and 2018, the government spent $150m in 14 urban centres. Roads that had been in a sorry state for several years finally received a facelift and more are being worked upon.
