Masvingo Beitbridge Road; Mpofu please give us a better answer

Not that I hate Minister Mpofu or have anything against him, but am only concerned heavily about the rate at which people are dying on roads under his Ministry.

Here is a comment I put on a dialogue we had last week with some friends when we were busy celebrating Obert Mpofu's refusal to answer in Shona at Parliament. Well I also applauded his stance and condemned the Deputy Speaker for trying to force him to speak one language against the other when all of them are not only parliament official languages but also constitutionally national languages.

That as it may be here was my comment;

"Its good sibili that we celebrate that Mpofu refused to be forced to speak in Shona when he wanted to speak in Ndebele, but I am more concerned about the answer that was given to the question asked than the language that was used to answer the question. I wish all of us would concentrate on that part of this whole matter. The question asked in Shona was on what the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure Development was doing about the Beitbridge Masvingo Harare Road which is a now as good as a death trap.

The answer given (yes in Ndebele) was the usual short and dismissal one that almost every Minister gives which is that government has prioritised the matter and will look into it as soon as funds are available.

The road needs urgent action not joking and point scoring about it. It would have been great if all our applause was for an excellent plan of action tabled that immediately this is what will be done to curb accidents on the road not to applause the medium of communication used." (That was my comment and off course I was very unpopular for saying that but.....)

Before our cheers have even downed about twenty people have tragically died on the very same road. I really wish the same MP who asked that question would raise the issue again in Parliament and this time demand for a serious answer in terms of what the Ministry of Transport is planning to do about that road in the immediate future not the "when funds are available" future as the funds will never snow from heaven even if our prophets were to pray for miracle money. Besides, even if the money was to rain from the sky no matter in what quantity it will never get to the project intact.

So forget about the when funds are available future on this.

There are other roads that are in a slightly better condition that the haulage trucks can use to get to Beitbridge than keep them on the Masvingo Beitbridge little strip road. It only takes an instruction that all heavy vehicles use an alternative route to Beitbridge no matter how much longer it will be.

The trucks can be diverted to use the Masvingo, Mbalabala Gwanda to Beitbridge road which is wider and safer than forcing the trucks to keep bumping on each other and riding on small cars until the road is fixed. We need to ask what's more important life or money?

Wish the Minister would go to Parliament with a better answer this week and hope there is no other death on that road in the meantime.

Bekezela Maduma is an independent social and political commentator and writes in his own capacity. This article is extracted from his page, Facebook www.facebook.com/bekezelamaduma and can be contacted directly on bekezelamaduma@yahoo.co.uk