Maputo — The building of the pipeline that will transport natural gas to the southern Mozambican city of Matola, resumed last week, reports Wednesday's issue of the daily paper "Noticias".

The main pipeline runs from Temane in Inhambane province, where the gas fields are located, to Secunda in South Africa. The pipeline to Matola branches off from the main pipeline at Ressano Garcia, on the South African border This work should have been completed by December, but that proved impossible since the workers, many of whom are South African citizens, were granted one month's leave for the festive season. Completion of the Matola pipeline is now due during the first half of this year.

Two teams are placing the pipes, one starting at Ressano Garcia, and the other starting at the industrial area in Matola.

The building of the processing centre in the Matola neighbourhood of Mussumbulucu, from where the gas will be distributed to the consumers, has been completed.

Luke Zulu, in charge of the work at the Matola suburb of Liberdade, said that, but for the interruption for the festive season, the placing of the pipes would already be completed.

"Because we don't have a map of the water pipes and electricity or telephone cables along the road, we sometimes damaged them when using bulldozers to open the two meter deep ditches. Now we prefer to do that job manually, which makes it very slow", he said.

He added, however, that despite this constraint, the commitment of the working teams will allow the job to be completed and distribution of gas to be started within the first half of 2005.

The pipes are 219.1 millimetres wide and 15 millimetres thick, and the gas pressure is initially to be 5,500 cubic metres per hour, but is later to be increased to 21,850 cubic metres per hour as the number of consumers grows.