Chronicle Editor
Oliver Kazunga, Acting Business Editor
THE National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) and the Botswana Railways (BR) will soon enter into a strategic partnership to provide passenger train service linking Gaborone and Harare to promote regional integration.
At the moment, BR offers passenger train service between Gaborone and Bulawayo.
At a recent media briefing, NRZ board chairman, Advocate Martin Dinha told journalists in Bulawayo that BR has proposed passenger train service linking Gaborone and Harare.
“Soon we will be meeting our Botswana counterparts who have proposed to provide passenger train service for the Gaborone-Francistown-Bulawayo-Harare route.
“We are engaging them within the context of regional integration in Sadc,” he said.
Adv Dinha said the proposed arrangement was in line with NRZ’s strategic agenda to chase after business from all sectors of the economy and this was premised on the need to consolidate its freight volumes and boost operational efficiency.
“Those are exciting developments for NRZ. We are here for business and NRZ will never be the same again as we want to do the job and doing it right.”
He said it was imperative to capacitate NRZ to improve on operational efficiency to cope with demand for passenger train service as well as cargo business.
“For our capacity to be able to attract business, NRZ must be fully functioning. It’s one thing to yearn for the business but the other is do you have the capacity.
“Right now, it’s a sad story if you go to our train stations at 8PM or before when our people are scrounging and scrambling to catch a ride to Harare because we have the cheapest commuter services in the country; far cheaper than road.
“But we cannot satisfy that volume of business and we are saying if we get support from Government, and the private sector we must be able to provide an efficient, safe reliable and modern service for our people,” said Adv Dinha. — @okazunga.
Online Reporter