The government Uganda may loose up to US $78000 daily fine from the contractor if the Kampala Flyover Project is not rolled out on time as a result of the land dispute, the Uganda National Roads Authority (Unra).
Ms Allen Kagina, the Unra Executive Director announced the reports while appearing before the Parliament’s Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises (Cosase) and said the land disputes might delay the project.
“The contract is running, we have at the moment given the contractor land to start but we must in the shortest time possible acquire more land to give him, so he has not fined us yet,” said Ms Kagina.
“It is anticipated that when a contractor is given commencement he must have access to the land. Every delay means that he won’t work and when he doesn’t work, the contract requires that he charges us,” she added.
The discussion came after the MPs found that there was unlawful expenditure by Unra which amounted to US $40m, in the financial year of 2015/16. The committee tasked Unra officials to present a schedule of expenditure relating to the mischarge after which it was discovered that a number of alterations had been irregularly made in the budget. Ms Kagina explained that the internal reallocation expenditure was made to save government from huge losses, despite being a direct breach on the law.
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Kampala Flyover project
Unra, are implementing the entire project together with Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA), and it is being funded by government of Uganda and that of Japan through its overseas development agency called Japanese Integration Corporation Agency (JICA) at a tune of more than US $59m.
Phase one of the project include addition of lanes of a half a kilometer road from Shoprite at Queen’s Way towards Katwe side, improvement of Nsambya Road, Mukwano Road and part of Ggaba Road, and lastly construction of the Clock Tower flyover which will be 500 meters long. All this work is expected to be complete by the year 2021.
Phase 2 of the project which will also be funded by JICA at a cost of close to US $175m, shall begin after the completion of the 1st phase. This phase shall see the construction of flyovers at Kitgum round about on Jinja Road near the Centenary Park and Wampewo Roundabout. The tendering of the design for the second phase will be announced next year.
The project was conceived by JICA eight years ago after commissioning studies to explore options for easing the hectic traffic jams around the Greater Kampala Metropolitan Area where motorists who live 30 kilometers away from the city spend more than two hours on traffic before reaching their destination especially during the peak hours. The flyovers will also be connect outwards to the proposed Kampala-Jinja and Kampala-Mpigi Expressways.
