Rwanda : Southern Province’s Governor visits a deteriorating road in Nyaruguru district

Rwanda’s Southern Province Governor, Alphonse Munyantwali, on Thursday made a one-day risk-assessment visit to the part of a road on the brink of completely sliding in Nyaruguru district, Southern Rwanda, and promised appropriate action before any further damage.

For part of the road in Nyabimata sector – where the repairing process has begun since May and a field engineer promised the mending of the road will be done by November – the road went under the surface and then an overlooking hill slid into the road, barring the road for pedestrians and vehicles, mainly those daily heading to the neighbouring Nshili Tea Factory.

“Our recovery efforts first dealt with making a makeshift road for vehicles to continue passing before any other undertaking”, Théogène Muhabwa, the other field engineer, said as he stood on the roadside overseeing a bulldozer working.

And for another segment of the road in Ruheru sector, the landslide has reached such an extent that, as Nyaruguru district Mayor François Habitegeko put it, “a single heavy rain fall would slide the road completely and make it impassable”.

Ibrahim Manirakiza, a bus driver, is concerned with the situation.

“I get afraid when I reach this part of the road. But because there is no other road to use, I just try to slow down as much as I can when I reach there”, Manirakiza said, as he drove a bus full of passengers to neighbouring town district of Huye.

But the trend may not be to last any longer, if the words of Governor Munyantwali are anything to go by.

“Certainly this part of the road [in Ruheru sector] is not in good shape and a lot needs to be done. And I am going to do advocacy in this regard. Even so, I am happy that activities on the other side of the road [in Nyabimata sector] are close to completion”, said Governor Munyantwali.

Rwanda’s typical heavy rain fall from April up to late June and the soil’s fragile nature in the area are considered a scapegoat of the deteriorating conditions for the dirt road linking Ruheru sector to Nyabimata sector and then Ruheru sector to the neighbouring town district of Huye.