Let’s change our priorities

In recent months, we have heard much about the state of our roads in Botswana. Last week, Thulagano Segokgo, Minister of Transport and Communications, said that his ministry is committed to improving the country’s road network. He expressed such sentiments when tabling his ministry’s budget estimates for the present 2021- 2022 financial year.

Indeed, some of our main roads are in a poor state; for example, the Sehithwa- Shakawe road where large sections are riddled with potholes or the tar has simply peeled away. It clearly needs to be renovated. The MP for Shashe West, Fidelis Molao, is quite correct in appealing for the construction of the Mandunyane-Mathangwane road since it will benefit many villages in his constituency and will divert much traffic, including large trucks, away from Francistown.

Recently, the new interchange in Francistown was completed. This has indeed done much to relieve traffic congestion in the city centre and now ensures a smoother flow of vehicles here. It was money well spent. However, this seems to have led to the rollout of interchanges elsewhere in the country. Let us consider two of these. Firstly, the Boatle interchange 20 kilometres south of Gaborone along the Gaborone- Lobatse road. Here two roads meet the A1 – one to the west leads to Mankgodi whilst the other runs east to Ramotswa. Now the question is – was this interchange really needed; was it a good use of our limited financial resources? I do not think so. Traffic along the road to Mankgodi is very light and even along the A1 itself and the Ramotswa road it is rarely heavy. Perhaps robots could have been installed here at a considerably lower cost? After all, robots occur at most major intersections in Gaborone where traffic is much heavier. And near Bokaa, there is a four- way intersection along the A1 ( which is a dual carriageway here) and yet the traffic here is controlled by robots. Or will we see yet another interchange here in future? Secondly, the interchange at Kgale, a few kilometres south of Gaborone; here only one road meets the A1 – the road leading to St. Joseph’s College. But traffic along this road is very light since it is very short and really only serves a school. Clearly, this interchange was not really needed; again, robots could have been installed here. Of course, one might argue that robots hinder the smooth flow of traffic and so might prolong one’s journey to Lobatse by a minute or two. But what is that compared to the millions of precious Pulas that are spent in constructing these interchanges? Even in rich Western nations, such as the UK, interchanges would never be built at such places; if they were, then there would be thousands of them along UK roads! Segokgo also said that it was important for the A1 road, between Ramatlabama and Ramokgwebana, to be made into a dual carriageway, or freeway. At present, only two sections have been upgraded in this way – Francistown- Tonota ( 30 kilometres) and Gaborone- Rasesa ( 40 kilometres). Since the A1 has a total length of 640 kilometres, it means that 570 kilometres would have to be upgraded. And so that would be a major undertaking at no small cost to the taxpayer. But do we really need this? The A1 road, at present, is in good shape; indeed, it would be considered a super highway in most African countries where roads are to be seen, to be believed. For example, ‘ main roads’ in the DRC may be no more than narrow muddy tracks where vehicles may be stuck for days, or are riddled with potholes large enough to hide your car! And in the Tibesti mountains in northern Chad, one may take a long day just to travel 100 kilometres along some of the region’s ‘ main roads’ ( I have been there and so can testify to that!). True, a dual carriageway may reduce your travel time between Gaborone and Francistown by five or ten minutes, but again what is that when compared to the cost of building such a road?

In South Africa, the N1 is the equivalent of our A1. This road extends from Beitbridge on the Zimbabwe border to Cape Town – a distance of 1 960 kilometres. However, this road is in the form of a dual carriageway in only two sections – between Gauteng and Polokwane and between Paarl and Cape Town. This means that only about one quarter of its length is a dual carriageway. And traffic is much heavier along this road than along our A1. So why do we need a dual carriageway along the entire length of our A1? In the UK, only a very small percentage of the road network consists of dual carriageways.

Freeways and interchanges may often be seen as prestigious projects in Africa and may not always be worth the money spent on them. What we need is to change our priorities when it comes to improving our road network.

Farmers often complain about the poor state of rural roads in the country which hinders them from transporting their produce to market. Now, as an example, the Tonota- Ditladi road is in a very poor state; here drivers may simply drive along the sides of the road rather than use the road itself. And yet this road is just nine kilometres long and there are many farmers in the area around Ditladi. So why not spend money on tarring this road and so help local communities and these farmers – it will be money well spent. And there are many other such roads that should be upgraded to bitumen standard. However, I am not saying that we should not construct long distance major roads, only that we need to prioritise more carefully.

Now compare that with a country like Malaysia where most places have an annual rainfall of over 2 000mm, and some places even more than 4 000mm; moreover, it rains there every month of the year! And yet the roads there remain in a good state ( I have lived there for seven years and so can testify to that). And another scapegoat for our poor roads is traffic. But compared to European countries we have very little traffic on our roads. Roads in the UK, for example, are very busy at all times and yet one would see very few potholes on them!

These days UB and BIUST produce civil engineers who could be employed by government to regularly check on roads that are being constructed; if they are not up to standard, then the companies building them should be penalised and possibly blacklisted and the work given to another company to complete. So often on roads that have not been well constructed I have noticed that the thickness of the bitumen layer is often thin. Perhaps the company involved had offered a lower price because they knew that they would cut back on the amount of bitumen they would use to surface the road? And maybe even more care should be taken when building roads in areas of sandy soils ( such as the Sehithwa- Shakawe road); sand provides a weak loose foundation on which to build a road and so such roads should be inspected more frequently during their construction. And extra care should also be taken when building roads across areas underlain by clay soils or pans. Between Zoroga and Gweta, the A3 road crosses part of the Ntwetwe Pan, here the road has been raised above the level of the pan but is often potholed. And where roads cross streams by means of bridges they may also be severely potholed; for example, where the A3 road crosses small streams between Dukwi and Nata. And many of us are aware of the damage, due to flooding last December, that was done to the A1 where it crosses the Motloutse river at Foley. Get Priorities Right