Maputo, 8 Jan (AIM) – The first international public tenders for the construction of a ring road and new bridge over the Licungo River, in Mocuba district, in the central Mozambican province of Zambézia, which will be funded by the United States Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), may be launched in the first half of this year.
According to Monday’s issue of the Maputo daily “Notícias”, construction work should start in 2025.
The agreement between the Mozambican government and the MCC, known as a “compact”, is valued at 537.5 million dollars. 500 million dollars is a grant by the MCC and the remaining 37.5 million dollars is Mozambique’s own participation.
The new bridge over the Licungo river will provide an alternative to the current bridge that carries the country’s main north-south highway (EN1) across the river. This is intended to provide greater safety and mobility for road users.
“A few days ago, the office responsible for the project management requested information from potential contractors in a public announcement with the aim of receiving feedback from the construction industry on the approach to tendering for the work”, according to “Noticias”.
The compact concentrates its effort on just one province, Zambezia, in the central part of the country. It covers three main areas – the promotion of investment in commercial agriculture; connectivity and rural transport; and climate change and coastal development.
The need to build a new bridge over the Licungo arose from the observation that the current one is congested and has exceeded its useful life. In addition, it has been damaged twice by floods since it was built in the 1940s.
The investment also envisages building a further 200 kilometers of national, regional and rural roads in Zambezia in order to ensure better distribution of agricultural produce. According to the MCC, the compact is also intended to protect the Mozambican coastline from the effects of climate change and over-fishing.
(AIM)
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