US$825M RAILWAY DEAL HALTED

....rail upgrade project put on hold due to moratorium on debt contracting

GOVERNMENT has halted a US$825 million contract with China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation for modified engineering, rehabilitation and upgrade of railway lines due to the moratorium on debt contracting. The contract was signed early last year between the Ministry of Transport and Communication and the Chinese firm, which is a subsidiary of state-owned China Railway Construction Corporation Limited.

Planned works included the mainline from Livingstone to Kafue Bridge which is 420.97 kilometres long, the 64.34km branch line from Masuku to Choma and another branch line from Livingstone to Mulobezi which is 162.95km long.

Ministry of Transport and Communication Permanent Secretary, Misheck Lungu, said the contract which was supposed to be serviced by a loan had been put on hold.

Mr Lungu said planned works had been halted because Government was not borrowing.

“You are not seeing activity and we have not moved on site because the government has a moratorium, it does not borrow anymore until such a time when the economy improves,” he said.

Mr Lungu said projects such as the rail upgrade would only be revisited when the economy improves.

The project is expected to cover nearly 650km of railway lines and was supposed to be completed in eight years.

The China Railway Construction Corporation Limited is a China-based construction company with headquarters in Beijing.

The Chinese corporation was ranked first in 2014 as the largest construction and engineering company in the world by revenue.