Chinese company takes over construction of abandoned road in Namibia

A Chinese company has secured a contract to complete a road abandoned by local companies in northern Namibia, it said.

The company, China Longjian Investment (Namibia) ( Pty) Ltd, got the job after the Namibia Investment Contract cc, Tix Investment cc and Dolly Investments had abandoned it.

According to the roads authority, the three companies were supposed to complete the construction of the seven-kilometer road in Omusati region (about 865 km from Windhoek) near the Angolan border within a year after starting work in 2013.

Construction work, the roads authority said, was stopped in early 2014 despite the companies getting 3.9 million Namibian dollars (286,000 U.S. dollars). The whole project is worth 35 million Namibian dollars (2.6 million U.S. dollars).

The director of the China Longjian, Du Weisong, said work on the road will start Monday next week and will be completed within the next seven months.

In May this year, the governor of the coastal region Cleophas Mutjavikua urged Namibians to adopt the Chinese's ethics of hard work.

Mutjavikua said this when he visited the site where the China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) is expanding the Namibian port at Walvis Bay.

"We need to listen, learn and adopt the Chinese way of thinking and working. We, as Namibians, during the skills transfer process must adopt the behaviour of Chinese workers so that we can in future undertake our own projects," Mutjavikua stated. Endit