“You are not informed”- Minister Kyofatogabye stings Lukwago on inflated costs for repairing Kampala roads

Kampala Minister, Kabuye Kyofatogabye has blasted Lord Mayor Erias Lukwago for not being informed about developments in the city when he said the costs for the forthcoming repairing works for Kampala roads has been inflated.

KCCA last month said it had got $288million( approximately shs1trillion) for repairing of 31 roads in the five divisions of Kampala.

Lukwago told journalists on Wednesday that a group of mafia and a cartel in the central government with proxies in KCCA have inflated the cost of repairing the roads to ensure each kilometer cost shs14.4 billion.

“For the 31 African Development Bank funded roads lined up for construction this year, they constitute 69km at a cost of shs1 trillion which translates to each kilometer being constructed at a whooping shs14.4billion. This is ridiculous a cost for the construction of these road. It is outrageous. These costs are obscenely inflated. Imagine if a kilometer is to cost shs14.4billion and you have 2110km of roads in the entire Kampala, how are we going to construct all of them? It means during our lifetime, we shall never finish constructing the roads in Kampala,”Lukwago said on Wednesday.

However, addressing journalists on Thursday, the Kampala Minister dismissed the allegations as untrue, noting that Lukwago is not informed about what is happening in his own area of jurisdiction.

“In his characteristic ill-informed but sensational manner, the Lord Mayor told lies and I am here to debunk his falsehoods and restore hope to our city and country away from his pessimistic naysaying and if he pleases, to invite him to always do more consultation on issues before making a farce of himself before all and sundry,” Kyofatogabye said.

Breakdown

On Wednesday, Lukwago said it is ridiculous that only 69km of roads in a flat terrain can cost shs1 trillion.

“We are not constructing in mountainous areas like Kisoro that we have to navigate around those terrains. What explains this inflated cost,”Lukwago wondered.

However, on Thursday, the Kampala Minister explained that not all the $288million (Shs1 trillion) will go towards roads construction but rather only $246.2million and that the rest will go towards other items related to the roads.

He said as part of the $246.2 million will also include navigating through five kilometres of “stormy” drainage works, signalization of 11 junctions, installation of over 1500 street lights and 30 public toilets among others.

“Then project management will take $14.95 million to include supervision of civil works including  consultants, monitoring and evaluation by the technical team, project implementation team at KCCA, the audit, solid waste management and development of urban designed guidelines. . Institutional support will take $3.6 million. Women and youth skill development will take $0.2million.The other lots like planting of 10,000 trees, additional roads were added onto the project. $11 million has been earmarked for compensation and resettlement of the project affected persons. This total cost is $288million and  out of this, about $48million is meant for other components of the project but only about $240 million will go into actual construction of roads including drainages.”

“All these things are before the Lord Mayor but his narrow mindedness and understanding of projects and components, you cant ramp up everything and say a kilometer is going to take shs14.4 billion by dividing the entire project cost and failing to itemize. If the Lord Mayor wanted to misguide the people of Kampala, he should have done so with facts that thinking you will confuse everyone.”

https://nilepost.co.ug/2023/01/04/shs14-4bn-per-km-lukwago-raises-red-flag-over-inflated-costs-for-works-on-kampala-potholed-roads/