City’s road projects under scrutiny

The project to rehabilitate Thabo Mbeki Street from Schoeman Street to the N1 traffic circle is behind schedule and causing great losses to businesses, not to mention the endless frustration of motorists resulting from closing of lanes.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) caucus in Polokwane Municipality said in a media release that it has requested Municipal Manager Dikgape Makobe to probe this project and to provide explanations for the delay. According to the DA, the contract stipulated that the six month project should have been completed by 22 November last year and there is no indication that it will be completed in the near future. “The surrounding businesses suffer the consequences. The DA has reliably been informed that a business in the area had to lay off employees as a result of the lack of timeous project management by the contractor and intervention by the municipality in repairing the streets,” the DA says, adding that some of the affected businesses might be forced to shut down due to revenue losses which may lead to unemployment and loss of income to the municipality.
“Many Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) workers contracted to work on this project have not been paid for over three months and they are threatening to down their tools which might cause more delays on this project. We have tried all avenues to escalate and intervene in this matter but to no avail,” the DA says. When visiting the site on Monday, an EPWP worker who did not want to be identified, confirmed to Polokwane Observer that he had not been paid for three months.
The DA urges Makobe to probe the delay to ensure that the project is completed as soon as possible to decrease the congestion. “We request that this be done by focusing on proper project management and that the end product complies with the required standards,” the DA stressed.
Communications and Marketing Manager of the municipality, Matshidiso Mothapo commented as follows:

“There were two challenges experienced with this project. First there were challenges with the contractor’s payments from the municipality due to SARS matters and they had to sort out that before further work could continue. After resolving that the second and main delay challenge was with underground services. The recycling of the section of this road has to be done at an increased depth suitable for high volume traffic. Unfortunately, during the removal of existing layers a challenge was encountered with critical underground services that had to be relocated because they were shallow and not according to regulations. The services were installed around 2008. This is a critical telecommunications fibre network that banks and other business institutions rely on. The municipality couldn’t act irresponsibly by damaging the cables because it would have adversely brought the whole city on its knees. The owners of the infrastructure were engaged with regards to the lowering and protection of telecommunications network, but there were delays in relocating the infrastructure to the correct depth. This significantly delayed the project progress. The last service relocation was completed on 16 January 2018. With the issue of underground services resolved, the project is now progressing with construction activities. The contractor has improved site management and the consultants are providing full time supervision to ensure the project is completed.
The Municipal Manager and the Executive Mayor had a consultation meeting with the business community during last year and among the issues tabled during that engagement was the challenges experienced with construction in the city. According to our information, the contractor delayed payment of EPWP labourers by a period not more than 7 days during October and November. However, to date all the EPWP labourers are paid in full. This matter will be followed up with the project managers. We apologise to all stakeholders for the inconvenience caused as it was not by design, but by challenges that were unforeseen. It is in the interest of the municipality to contribute towards economic growth of the city and the municipality will continue to create conducive environment for business to thrive. The Municipal Manager is diligent and by the time the letter was received the challenges were resolved and work was continuing to ensure that the upgrading of Thabo Mbeki Street is done and dusted.”

Story & photos: BARRY VILJOEN
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