By Mathew Kanu
In furtherance of the road maintenance fund policy and further collaboration with the local councils, the Road Maintenance Fund administration has allocated 15% of funds collected from the road user charge to 17 of the 19 councils across the country. It was followed by a series of meetings the councils by the Fund’s head of public relations Kumba Brewah.
Addressing workers of the Bombali and Makeni City Councils, Kumba said she was meeting them to ascertain at first hand the success, challenges and the way forward for feeder road maintenance within the two councils.
Kumba later told journalists that the 19 local councils in Sierra Leone had benefited from the road maintenance fund with the total disbursement of Le 9 Billion in two tranches.
“At present the councils only have 15 percent of the funds allocated to them for road maintenance and the final trench will be given after the successful implementation of the first 15 percent” she said.
Bombali District Chairman John Shangai Koroma said in the meeting that out of Le 1 Billion allocated to the council Le 150 Million had been received as the first trench for feeder road maintenance. He said their challenge was implementing the allocated amount of Le 1 Billion in all 13 chiefdoms of the District.
Koroma emphasised that timber logging, the rains season and people’s expectations were some of the challenges of handling the feeder road maintenance. “Despite the challenges the fund will enable the total participation of everybody in the district making the people the owners of the road maintenance fund, and the easy access of goods and services within and out of the district” he said.
Mayor of Makeni Sunkarie Kabba Kamara said that even though the Fund was helpful to the municipality road maintenance, the people had misunderstood it to be owned by the Sierra Leone Roads Authority and could not distinguish between those roads the council should fix and those the Authority had responsibility over. “This is a major challenge for the funds allocated to the city council feeder road maintenance” she said, adding however that “the good thing about the funds is the total involvement of youth within the municipality”.
Paramount Chief Bai Sheeborah Kasanha II of Bombali Sheborah Chiefdom said the fund was meant to address the problems associated with the transportation of goods and services in the chiefdom and the district in general. “Maintenance of feeder roads will improve the lives of rural and urban people in the localities” he said.
