Mutare (New Ziana) – The City of Mutare has embarked on a Z$2.5 million road rehabilitation exercise throughout the city, an official said on Friday.

City spokesperson, Spren Mutiwi said the local authority had already completed re-sealing the first street, covering a distance of 1.1 kilometres.

Funding for the project was obtained from the Zimbabwe National Roads Authority (ZINARA).

“The local authority has embarked in overdrive to refurbish the road network. So far we have completed the re-sealing of the first street,” said Mutiwi.

“The council has engaged Fossil Contractors to do the job while we play the supervisory role,” he said.

In addition, Mutiwi said council was also continuing with other routine road-related rehabilitation projects such as patching of potholes across the city.

“Soon we shall be extending our periodic road rehabilitation to aerodrome road. The major challenge we are facing is that almost the entire road network in the city has outlived its lifespan and requires re-sealing,” he said.

He said the city required more than $30 million to upgrade its entire 500 kilometre road network.

“We can only do as we much as we receive grants from the national roads administration. We are hopeful that if Zinara increases the grants and disburse timeously, we will be able to make a great impact,” he said.

Mutiwi said Mutare has great potential to attract regional and international investors if they continue to upgrade the city`s road network.

“We have not done badly, but we are not where we would have wanted, but we have done fairly well as compared to other local authorities, “he said.

New Ziana