30 October 2008
Maputo — The Mayor of Maputo, Eneas Comiche, inaugurated on Wednesday the rebuilt Avenue General Sebastiao Marcos Mabote, a major thoroughfare linking the outlying neighbourhoods of Magoanine A and B, Mahotas and Albazine.
At the same time, the Maputo bus company, TPM, inaugurated new buses and routes, linking Magoanine B and Albasine, along Sebastiao Mabote Avenue, to the city centre.
For eight years, this avenue, named after one of the heroes of Mozambique's liberation war, was in such a state of disrepair that buses could not use it. This forced the 130,000 inhabitants of those neighbourhoods to walk about five kilometres to the nearest bus terminal.
Others, however, would resort to the few private minibuses still operating in the area, but that meant investing long hours of waiting and considerable sums of money, to pay for at least three minibuses, as most of the operators took the advantage to make huge profits by illegally shortening their routes.
"This represents the end of an era of misery for the residents of Albazine, Mahotas, and Magoanine. Under the previous conditions, it was unthinkable to have decent transport, and many investment projects were postponed", said one resident, speaking on behalf of the entire community.
"Now, the mini-bus operators have no more reason to shorten the routes," he said, to huge applause from thousands of people who had gathered there to witness the hand over ceremony.
For Comiche, the inauguration of the road represents the fulfillment of a promise he made in 2003, when he was elected mayor. He said that this is one of the major projects included in the Maputo Municipal Development Program (PROMAPUTO), currently under way in the capital, and intended mainly to benefit the outlying urban districts
"This endeavour is far reaching", he said. "It is the beginning of a number of major ventures. This will be followed by the paving of Nelson Mandela Avenue" (which is about 5.5 kilometres long, running from the main north-south highway to Sebastiao Mabote avenue).
Nelson Mandela Avenue is expected to be completed by the end of next year, Comiche said, urging the local residents to keep an eye on the new road.
Budgeted at about five million US dollars, the contract to rebuild Sebastiao Mabote Avenue was awarded in November 2007 to a consortium formed by the Mozambican company Marcleusa and Conduril of Portugal.
Initially, the road was expected to be delivered by August 17, but the consortium failed to meet the deadline, which was later extended to 17 October.
Once again, the consortium failed to meet the new deadline, prompting the municipality to threaten the consortium with penalties.
However, the consortium claim that they were still within deadline agreed with the municipality for the delivery of road. According to Mario Guimaraes, Conduril representative in Mozambique, the delivery date, revised on October 23, states November 28 as the new deadline.
That delivery date was revised four times following negotiations between parties, the consortium and municipality.
"There was a three month delay at the beginning of the job. Instead of November, the work only started in March this year", Guimaraes told AIM. He tried to blame the municipality for the deal, claiming that it had dragged its "in resettlement of people living along the road and further readjustments to the project".
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