Barry Streek
The accrued backlog for the upgrading, maintenance and repair of South Africa’s national roads, excluding provincial and district roads, was estimated at R3- billion at the start of the 1999/2000 financial year, Minister of Transport Dullah Omar has revealed.
However, only R775-million was allocated in the 1999/2000 financial year by the Department of State Expenditure for the upgrading as well as annual maintenance and repair of non-toll national roads.
Omar, who was replying to a question which was tabled in the National Assembly by Paul Swart (Democratic Party), said that as the allocation from the Department of State Expenditure was insufficient for the maintenance needs of the current network of national roads, “construction of new national roads can only occur if they are developed as toll roads through innovative financing mechanisms”.
He also said the 1998 Moving South Africa study concluded that the South African road network was in decline and it estimated the annual funding shortfall for road infrastructure at R4,7 billion in 1997.