AFRICAN RENAISSANCE AT GRASSROOTS 

It is a strange but true fact that if King Cetshwayo, who died in 1884, were to rise again today he would easily find his way around his surroundings because they would largely be just the same as when he was alive. That is the barren legacy that the people of KwaZulu-Natal, especially those in rural areas, inherited from the past government. 

But things have begun to change rapidly since democratic government came into being in 1994. The African Renaissance Roads Upgrading Programme (ARRUP) of the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Transport is one such development investment initiative that has contributed to this change. 

Linked to the vision of the African Renaissance, ARRUP opens up our own heritage and our own history and will ultimately enable the citizens of our country to emphatically declare that true liberation has come. 

The KZN Transport Department has long realized that South African society cannot be deracialised unless the government committed itself to fully integrating Blacks into the mainstream of the economy. ARRUP is designed to upgrade critical rural transport corridors from gravel to blacktop. Improved road access will dramatically reduce transport-related costs and provide the necessary infrastructural conditions to promote sustainable community development and economic growth. 

Relatively inaccessible communities will now be better placed to attract donors who might wish to partner with them in much needed development programmes or to link investors with local business opportunities. 

ARRUP projects have rapidly become an important vehicle to realise co-operative governance and integrated rural development. Most projects are designed to last at least three years. In effect this means a concentration of technical personnel and plant in rural communities that can be cost efficiently utilised to plan and implement a new dispensation that goes beyond the delivery of road infrastructure. 

Many of the ARRUP projects transverse areas of breathtaking beauty and involve communities that have a rich historical significance for the province. Improved road access is expected to result in viable investment opportunities that promote eco- and cultural tourism. 

All ARRUP projects are designed to normalise the road construction industry in KwaZulu-Natal and to maximise local wealth creation. The design and supervision phase encourages close working partnerships between well-established and recently established civil, technical and social consultants within frameworks that promote ongoing community participation. Roadwork contracts are awarded to established and emerging contractors who are required to maximise local employment and local supplier opportunities. 

ARRUP is a bold initiative that is creating wealth within resource-poor communities and unlocking their development potential. At the same time, all contracts are awarded with the explicit overall objective of transforming the road construction industry in KwaZulu-Natal. 

The following roads are presently being upgraded: 

• Main Roads 235, 52 and 49 extending from Mtubatuba to Vryheid via KwaHlabisa and Nongoma, and from Nongoma to Pongola (105, 3 km at a cost of R137 million).

• Main Roads 230 and 525, District Roads 1552 and 1667, Local Roads 2582 and 2581 extending from Obanjeni to Eshowe via Ongoye Forest and KwaMaqwakazi (46,4 km at a cost of R80 million).

• Main Roads 15 and 50 extending from Kranskop to Nkandla via Komo, Nkandla to Fort Louis and Komo Store to Eshowe (89,2 km at a cost of R156 million).

• Main Road 100 extending from Verulam to Inanda via Ndwedwe (42 km at a cost of R74 million).

• Main Road 68 extending from Highflats to Umtentweni via Dweshula and St. Faiths (51 km at a cost of R93 million). 

Over the years the department has systematically introduced measures consistent with the presidential Black Economic Commission’s call for genuine black empowerment and the realisation that we will only become a truly free nation when we have achieved freedom from hunger, freedom from the daily struggle to survive and freedom to provide our children with education, health care, shelter and hope. ARRUP is one such measure.  

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