This is according to the MEC for the Department of Public Works, Road, and Infrastructure, Nkakareng Rakgoale. She presented the department’s 2023/24 budget of nearly R5 billion at the legislature on Friday, April 21. “Our people are expecting more improved infrastructure investment, but we are currently unable to address all service delivery concerns due to budgetary constraints. A few months after Limpopo was severely affected by floods, 11 bridges were washed away across the province, with Mopani and Vhembe districts being the hardest hit.

Preliminary assessments indicate that 202 roads are badly damaged. These floods have reversed the work of rehabilitation and patching of potholes that we launched in August last year through ‘Operation Thiba Mekoti Ditseleng,” she said. “Road infrastructure challenges dominate the agenda of our business as a department and its entity Roads Agency Limpopo (RAL). We completed phase 1 maintenance work in the Mopani district on D1292 from D1350 to R529 Nkambake, D3840 from Giyani to Phalaborwa, and D3200 from R81 to Mokwakwaila.

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She said maintenance work in the Mopani district has also progressed. The D3840 from Giyani to Phalaborwa is at 99%, D11 Ga-Mamaila Kolobetona is at 90%, D3873 Bokgaga to Lephephane, phase 1 is at 75%, D3880 Lenyenye to D4139 Mosoroni, phase 1 is at 90%, and the D3641 from D3812 Giyani to D3745 Altein, phase 1 is at 92%. The D1909 from P17/4 to Timbavati is at 39% completion and the D3179 from Medingeng to Malematsa is at 25%.

“We are currently in the design stage for roads D548 Georges Valley from R36 in Tzaneen to R71 Haenertsberg, and the P43/3 road leading from Letaba Ranch to Eiland designs are completed,” added Rakgoale. She said she wants to encourage the private sector to come on board to support RAL. “In the 2022/23 financial year, our strategic partners in the private sector have contributed about R400 million as a way of co-funding the development of the province’s road infrastructure.” She said RAL has also signed an MOU with 10 local municipalities to do routine road maintenance and pothole patching. In Mopani, the Ba-Phalaborwa Municipality will benefit from the MOU. For the 2023/24 financial year, RAL will receive an allocation of just more than R2 billion, she concluded.