Minister of Finance and National Planning Dr. Situmbeko Musokotwane has disclosed that the construction of the dual carriage route from Lusaka to the Copperbelt will commence in the next four to five weeks.
Musokotwane said government will soon conclude a deal with the private sector to construct the Lusaka-Ndola dual carriageway adding that the private sector and not government will fund the construction.
Speaking during a media briefing at Mulungushi International Conference Centre today, attended by the Zambian Business Times-ZBT, Musokotwane said the Lusaka-Ndola road is in very bad shape hence the need to fix it but government will not borrow large sums of money to do so and will instead engage the private sector.
“The process is in a very advanced stage, in the next four to five weeks we should be able to put a contractor and say do this road, pay for it and you collect fees or whatever arrangement we will work together as a government”, he said.
He noted that government is focusing on Public Private Partnerships and the private sector has shown a lot of interest therefore government will continue to pursue such initiatives.
The Minister explained that government is putting in place measures to deal with the debt crisis in order to encourage more investments in the country and work with the private sector on both roads and power.
“We are also trying to come up with a similar arrangement and work on the Lusaka-Livingstone road, Sesheke to Kazungula, there are also other roads that the private sector is pursuing like linking DRC through the Northwestern Province to Solwezi, Kasempa and Kaoma. Soon we should see the benefits to the Zambian economy in terms of more money and also more business opportunities and more jobs”, Musokotwane said.
