Online Reporter
Freeman Razemba
Senior Reporter
THE Government has commissioned and opened to traffic the Manyame River Bridge, while the Mucheke River Bridge will be commissioned on Thursday, with the rehabilitation of the Harare-Chirundu Highway set to commence in August this year.
Five contractors — Fossil, Tensor Systems, Masimba Construction, Exodus and Company, and Bitumen World — have each been allocated about 67km to ensure timely completion of the reconstruction of the Harare-Chirundu Highway.
Works on the Harare-Nyamapanda Highway, including a modern facility at Nyamapanda Border Post, are also expected to commence soon.
This milestone marks a major step forward in upgrading the country’s key transit routes.
The development was revealed by Transport and Infrastructural Development Minister Felix Mhona yesterday when he opened the Manyame River Bridge on the Harare-Masvingo highway, to traffic.
The commissioning of the bridges will ease congestion, improve road safety, and boost trade along one of the country’s busiest transport corridors.
Minister Mhona was accompanied by Mashonaland East Provincial Affairs and Devolution Minister Advocate Itayi Ndudzo, legislators and senior Government officials.
Recently, a 36km dual carriageway was constructed along the Harare-Masvingo-Beitbridge Highway from the Chartergrade area to Harare’s city centre, and plans are underway to relocate the Skyline Tollgate.
The dualisation of the Harare-Beitbridge road near the Manyame River Bridge is also part of the broader national highway upgrade, with a 15-kilometre stretch from Chartergrade to just before the bridge having opened to traffic in July 2023.
Plans to relocate the Skyline Tollgate to the 36kilometre peg along the Harare-Masvingo Road are now at an advanced stage.
Tollgates are generally not erected within urban areas but are positioned beyond the edge of urban development, or in gaps between towns and cities, to avoid commuter traffic having to pass through twice a day.
“As a ministry, we are excited today. I want to give thanks to His Excellency Cde Mnangagwa, our visionary President, who has been saying we need connectivity within the region,” said Minister Mhona.
“I am happy that this is one of the projects where we are talking about connectivity — that bridges are there to bridge geographical gaps. You can see this is the North-South Corridor, where we are moving south to South Africa and north to Zambia and Malawi.
“The reason we are so excited as a ministry is that we are following a dashboard, where we have been mapping the entire nation to see where exactly we can have bridges and trunk roads. This is one of the trunk roads we are talking about.
“During the recent presentation by His Excellency at the BNC with Botswana, he was talking to the ministry, in particular, to move and execute with speed issues to do with connectivity. I am happy that this bridge is one of the bridges we are commissioning this week. On Thursday, we will again be commissioning the Mucheke River Bridge.”
