Construction of flood-damaged KZN bridges to start in June
Construction at 18 of the bridges which were damaged during last month’s floods in KwaZulu-Natal is expected to start in June.
The floods, which claimed the lives of more than 400 people, caused massive damage to roads, bridges and other infrastructure in the province.
The National Disaster Management Centre’s Jurgen Dyssel told Parliament on Monday that the assessment reports have been completed.
“In terms of the bridges, there are a number of assessment reports that have been completed for the 18 bridge sites that were submitted by the department of KZN. The province will confirm funding by the 13 May, then construction of the bridges is supposed to commence from 1 June. This will form part of the Department of Transport that is submitted already.”
ALSO READ: Hundreds of evacuations as storms lash KZN
Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele told MPs on the ad-hoc committee dealing with the floods that government was unprepared.
“One of the challenges of this development here, the heaviest in terms of the millimetres of rain and almost unprecedented, is that we were just not ready in terms of our response. We are trying to catch up in terms of the gaps we have discovered as far as our readiness was concerned.”
KZN was again battered by floods over the past weekend.
One person was killed while over 200 others were displaced.
