By Judgement Katika
Dedza West Member of Parliament Savel Kafwafwa has prayed for a day the Nkhoma-Mayani road shall be developed into a tarmac, having in the meantime managed to gravel it to ease transportation challenges in the area.
Hon. Kafwafwa told us the road had been a challenge to the constituents, the last time it was maintained being in 30 years ago in 1986.
“People of Mayani have always had trouble whenever it rains as the road becomes slippery, however that has been minimized with the graveling”, Kafwafwa.
A minibus driver who uses the road everyday Enock Chikapa agreed that there is a significant improvement, as they have not had similar incidents like getting stuck in the mud this year.
“During the rainy season, we were driving two days to reach Nkhoma which is a distance of two-hour driving, and that affected our businesses”, he said.
Further, Senior Chief Tambala was all smiles, saying the road has assisted them in many ways for the farming area, because transportation of farm produce and other businesses was not possible, however now it will be easy.
“The poor roads here in Mayani resulted in loss of many opportunities. Last time a truck carrying fertilizer failed to make it because the road was impassable, impacting negatively on the poor farmers on this end”, said Chief Tambala.
A Catholic nun Sr. Christina Chikaiko, sister in-charge at the Catholic-owned Chimphwanya Health Center in Mayani was still worried with the state of the road, wishing there was a quick solution to this age-old problem. She prayed that for a tarmac road as soon as yesterday to ease the transportation challenges, especially when carrying out maternal referals to Nkhoma Hospital two hours away.
” Yes the legislator assisted us and we are grateful for that since we used to lose lives on this road, but the reasonable and long-lasting solution is to turn it into a tarmac road, afterall Mayani is a big trading center”, concluded Sr. Christina.