Africa-Press – Uganda. A total of 300km added to the road network in the just concluded Financial Year 2022/2023, the Uganda National Roads Authority (Unra) has said.
“Unra has expanded Uganda’s national road network by adding 254.5 KM in the FY 202/23, bringing the total paved stock to 6,133km,” the Executive Director of Unra, Ms Allen Catherine Kagina, said, adding that “in addition, 46km of town roads within various towns and municipalities outside the national road network were upgraded.”
Ms Kagina also said efforts are underway to establish long-term solutions to address persistent challenges affecting Katonga and Karuma bridges, particularly those caused by the impacts of climate change.
Ms Kagina disclosed that initial steps towards the construction of Katonga bridge on the Kampala-Masaka highway are in progress, and the project is anticipated to span a minimum of two years.
“We are going to do a completely new bridge and then do several culverts over a distance of 11kms starting from Kalandazi through to Lwera,” Ms Kagina told the media as she unveiled Unra’s performance of Financial Year 2022/23 in Kampala yesterday.
The director-in-charge of bridges and road maintenance, Mr Samuel Muhoozi, said: “We phased that project into three [stages]. [First was to] bring an immediate solution where you allow light traffic to pass, secondly construct a temporary still-bridge, strong enough to carry all the traffic. Then final [stage] in the 3rd phase, we have to construct a new bridge which will be higher and wider that can accommodate all the effects of climate change.”
He added: “This bridge also has other two sections. [These include] Lwera and the other part near Katonga, which will all be part of this [bridge]. So we have packaged all these three into one project but that will take like 1.5 to two years to complete.”
The Katonga project is being funded by the government of Uganda with works being undertaken by the Chinese firm -CCCC.
Relatedly, it was disclosed that government has since kick-started the process of conducting a feasibility study and drawing detailed engineering designs for a new bridge to be constructed at the Karuma dam along River Nile.
In so doing, the government plans to have project executed with support and funding from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) who were lead constructors of the state or the art Jinja Bridge along River Nile in Jinja.
The Director for Network Planning and Engineering, Mr Isaac Wani, said they were preparing the feasibility study and detailed engineering design for a new bridged.
He said: “The procurement will be done in Japan because it is a grant and we are following certain conditions.”
When asked about the costs of the project, Mr Wani said: “We have the cost at concept, which was about $50 million but the final cost will come out of the final detailed design process.”
Funds
Ms Kagina said: “Unra is currently actively engaged in the execution of 21 road development projects, including new construction and upgrading from gravel to paved bituminious standards. These projects cover a combined distance of 1,313kms.”
At the same media briefing, the Unra leadership reported that only Shs2.6 trillion was received to execute road constructions and other related activities planned for that year as opposed to the Shs3 trillion that had been approved by Parliament for the said Financial Year.
“The approved budget for the financial year 2022/23 was Shs3.0 trillion, however, the release was short by approximately 11.6 percent, amounting to Shs349.23 billion. The government of Uganda recurrent non-wage component took the biggest cut of 40.2 percent (Shs30.55 billion) followed by the development component cut by 20.8 percent (Shs316.39 billion),” Ms Kagina said.
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