Council under fire over potholes

News
BULAWAYO road users are increasingly at risk from the city roads riddled with potholes which have been further battered by widespread heavy rain and neglect

BULAWAYO road users are increasingly at risk from the city’s pothole-riddled roads, which have been further battered by widespread heavy rains and neglect in recent months.

potholes1

MTHANDAZO NYONI OWN CORRESPONDENT

Potholes on the city’s roads are blamed for causing too many mechanical failures costing motorists thousands of dollars in repairs every year.

Frustrated motorists have expressed outrage at the poor condition of the city’s roads saying the potholes had significantly increased the cost of maintaining cars.

Most of the city’s streets, whether they be in the central business district or residential areas, are being swallowed by potholes causing headaches for drivers.

Some motorists, who spoke to Southern Eye on Friday said the increasing rate at which potholes were forming on the city’s roads was a symptom of neglect of basic service delivery by both the local authority and central government.

They said it was disturbing that any water-filled gap in the road could be a deep pothole that might leave a motorist with a bent rim. The motorists complained that they were increasingly encountering numerous new and enlarged potholes causing damage to their vehicles since heavy rains lashed the city.

“Bulawayo City Council has failed to deal with potholes,” Ndumiso Tshuma, a motorist from Nkulumane, said.

“Instead, they keep filling up potholes with sand which doesn’t help because each time it rains, they widen causing damage to our vehicles and traffic congestion as we try to avoid them,” Tshuma said.

Commuter omnibus driver, Mandlenkosi Mthombeni, who plies the Luveve route, said Bulawayo’s roads were now death traps and appealed to the city fathers to act.

“The city fathers should do something because we are experiencing unnecessary costs of repairing our cars and tyre punctures caused by the potholes.

“Why do they want to wait for fatalities before they act? A number of accidents have been caused by these potholes,” Mthombeni said. He said motorists were paying road tax and they expected that money to be channelled towards repairing roads.

Bulawayo deputy mayor Gift Banda said council was keen to repair the battered roads, but resources were limited.

“We are flatly working on the issue of road maintenance, but the problem is resources. We are working in hard economic conditions, but we believe something will come up soon. It is something we have given priority to in our budget,” Banda said.

According to council’s 2013 budget review statement, road infrastructure development projects for 2014 include the reconstruction of a five-kilometre road around the city at a cost of $1,1 million.

The local authority has also proposed to reseal 10km of road surface at a cost of $750 000 around the city while another $500 000 is expected to go towards upgrading 145km of the city’s gravel roads.

The local authority, however, is expected to struggle to finance its capital projects with an anticipated drop in revenue following government directive to write off $49,9 million it was owed by residents soon after the elections last year.

Pothole