Malawi not neglecting other transport modes

Minister of Transport and Public Works Francis Kasaila has said government is not neglecting other transport sectors such as rail, aviation and marine, but that circumstances have forced them to put more effort in the road sector.

Kasaila, in an interview in Lilongwe on Monday, said when the country attained multiparty democracy, there was political strife in Mozambique, hence the country had to concentrate on the road transport to Tanzania and Durban in South Africa.

His sentiments come at a time several stakeholders, including the European Union (EU) have indicated that the road network in Malawi has improved significantly while other transport modes have received less attention.

“It is true that some people might be thinking that we are only interested in the road sector, but that is not the case. What people should know is that when we moved from being a one-party State to a multi-party State, there was political strife in Mozambique and we could not use the railway properly. We had to get our imports from Durban and Dar es Salaam [Tanzania] and the only way was to use the road,” he said.

Kasaila said government has instituted several studies aimed at revamping the civil aviation, rail as well as the water transport sectors.

“We want to explore the possibility of having a rail road that connects the Central Region to the North so that some imports from Tanzania can be moved by train.

On the water transport, we are happy that the concessionaire [Mota-Engil] is building a new ship, which will help to ease most of the problems faced by people living along the lake, more especially those from Likoma once commissioned,” he said.

But Head of the Delegation of the EU in Malawi Marchel Gerrmann urged government to give equal support to all transport sectors, including rail, water and air if the gains already made should be sustained.

“The road network has developed rapidly while other transport modes such as rail, aviation and marine have received less attention. Also, within the road sub-sector, trunk roads have developed rapidly, but the development of lower rural roads has lagged behind and has not produced the expected traction for the development of the rural areas,” he said.

According to Gerrmann, the uneven achievements have given rise to unbalanced and unsustainable development of the transport network as a whole and prevented real intermodal solutions and fostered monopolies in transport services.

He said the uneven achievements have also failed to create cost efficient transport links from farms and factory gates to market centres and across borders to international trading centres.