Mnangagwa misses out as Beitbridge renames suburbs, streets

BEITBRIDGE Municipality has completed the process of renaming streets, suburbs and business centres in line with its modernisation drive.
The exercise which involved the consultation of residents and other stakeholders, was carried out in terms of section 212 of the Urban Council Act (Chapter 29:15).

Beitbridge town was elevated into a municipality on 9 March in 2018 as part of the Second Republic's initiative to accelerate development.

The town with an estimated population of 100 000 has been growing rapidly in the last decade in terms of infrastructure development.

Beitbridge town clerk, Mr Loud Ramakgapola said consultative meetings were held with residents, local legislators and other stakeholders between 2016 and 2018 to propose and adopt new street and suburb names.

He said they are now working on installing signage, which includes billboards and maps of the street and suburbs.

"We have named some streets and suburbs giving them names of our traditional leaders and prominent families who stayed in this town," he said.

"For example we now have townships called Madinginye in honour of headman Madinginye, Khwalu named after Chief Khwalu, Mabidi named after

Headman Mabidi, Tshidixwa (Senior Village head), Matibe (Chief Matibe), and Tshitaudze (Chief Tshitaudze). We also have our industrial area now called Milayo Industrial area."

Mr Ramakgapola said they are seeking sponsorship to erect signage in some areas so that the names are known to the residents, stakeholders, service providers and visitors to the town".

So far the council has erected billboards in selected spots in a few suburbs.

Under the new set-up, the town will have 12 suburbs namely: Matibe (low density formerly Eastly), Tshidixwa (old Medium Density near OJs Business Centre), Sitauze (Mashavire, Hlalani Kuhle/Garikai, Two Rooms and Mangavha areas), Khwalu 1 (Shule-Shule and SDP stands), Kwalu 2 (Mfelandawonye and Forit stands), Mabidi (Medium Density west of White Lodge) and Vhembe View (old Low Density and CBD area).

Other suburbs are Madinginye (High and Medium Density west of Welton Primary School), Siyoka (Low Density stands along Bulawayo Road), Limpopo View (west of border post), Dulivhadzimu (old Dulivhadzimu and Vhembe High School area) and Milayo industrial area (Industrial area north of old Medium Density suburbs).

Some of the road names are Tshikwelengwe (the roads that lead to Masvingo and Harare) and Robert Mugabe (the road leading to Gwanda and Bulawayo.

Granite and Hagelthorn roads which cut across the border and CBD have been renamed Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo.The other major roads are Mahopolo, Industrial Link, Makhado, Tshinoni (CBD), Tshifhumila (CBD), Kohomela (Industrial), Mazibeli (Medium Density Suburb), Goda (Limpopo View Suburb) and Makavhane (Dulivhadzimu Suburb).

Mr Ramakgapola said the naming of streets and suburbs would help to improve service delivery issues.

"These include the provision of social amenities, and addressing challenges around services such as ambulances, fire brigade, police and response to emergency calls," he said.

Prior to the latest development, the border town had only one high-density suburb, Dulivhadzimu. Most of the new suburbs were identified based on the names of business centres and land developers.

"Services such as postal deliveries could not be introduced without a proper organisation of suburbs and streets, thereby hindering billing systems among other challenges," said Mr Ramakgapola.