B-METRO COMMENT: Council must fix potholes

THE Bulawayo City Council (BCC) has for years been rated as the best local authority in Zimbabwe and rightly so. 

The city fathers and mothers have gone of their way to deliver excellent service to the residents of Bulawayo, but there is one area where the council is letting down its people — potholes. 

Like other cities and towns, BCC takes its time filling in serious potholes. The council used to have a good track record on road repairs but that is not the case anymore as most roads in Bulawayo are now a hazard to motorists. 

We understand that the council has financial challenges, but there is no excuse when it comes to filling in potholes that pose serious danger. Such potholes should be filled within hours after they are noticed, not days, weeks and months. 

We are not saying the council should quickly patch up every pothole that appears on our major roads but it should be seen to be making an effort to fill in potholes before the situation gets out of hand. The rains are coming and if the council fails to get on top of the situation, potholes will dominate most of our roads and the council will struggle to do away with them. Where a pothole is a danger to pedestrians and other traffic users, the council must act as soon as it can.

The local authority should adopt a “risk-based approach” to fixing road defects with the volume of traffic taken into account when deciding how quickly to act. In other words, potholes on our most busy roads must be filled within reasonable time. We assume that BCC has a set minimum size of potholes that prompt them to act, but something is stopping them from doing their job. 

That said, whatever it is, it is not an excuse. We demand good roads. It is our right to drive on roads that are paved and smooth, after all the council taxes us of our hard earned money. 

Keeping roads safe for all users is one of the most important jobs that BCC should do. We understand the financial constraints that are bedevilling them, but priority must be given to repairing potholes that pose the greatest risk based on their size and location.

Of course we understand that the council cannot know all the time when a pothole has developed but it should open lines of communication that the caring public will use to report serious potholes that pose a danger. We are not suggesting that the council does not have teams that receive such reports, we are just urging it to promote citizen participation in resolving the pothole problem for good. 

Council inspectors should be on the ground inspecting the roads every day. We see them almost every day recording road violations, towing away vehicles and harassing vendors that are trying to make ends meet. It is within their right to do so, we just pray that they harass potholes the way they harass our poor parents who are just out to raise money to put food on the table. 

This Editorial Comment is a call for action and we do not apologise for it. We demand an overnight response or an urgent attendance to the pothole crisis.

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