“The Sanral projects within the Merafong City Local Municipality include routine road maintenance (RRM) on the N12 national road from Rand West City’s municipal border to the Gauteng/North West border, the N14 national road from Rand West City’s municipal border to the Gauteng/North West border, the R54 national road from Emfuleni’s municipal border to the Gauteng/North West border, the R500 national road from the Gauteng/North West border to Carletonville and the R501 national road from Rand West City’s municipal border to Gauteng/North West’s border. The estimated contract value for the RRM projects is R105,817,816,” says Tony Seloana, Sanral’s Northern Region project manager. “Besides the RRM projects, Sanral also has an upgrade project on the R501 national road from Potchefstroom to Carletonville.”
Due to the large scope of the projects, Sanral held a “Taking Sanral to the People” stakeholder engagement session at the local municipality last week. The event aimed to foster dialogue with small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs) and community members about Sanral’s upcoming road maintenance and upgrade projects.
Speaking to the stakeholders at the information-sharing session, Jullecsia Saul, Sanral’s Northern Region stakeholder coordinator, explained the purpose of “Taking Sanral to the People”.
“The roads agency engages its stakeholders to share information about its current and upcoming projects and economic benefits like job opportunities for local communities and the sub-contracting opportunities the projects offer targeted local businesses,” said Saul.
According to Sanral, Merafong City is a unique local municipality, incorporating some of the richest gold mines that contribute to the South African economy at a local and national level. The successful implementation of the two Sanral projects in Merafong will elevate economic activity and contribute to the economic growth of Carletonville as a whole. The movement of goods, services and people will improve once these projects are completed.
Sanral’s board chairperson, Themba Mhambi, also addressed the stakeholders. He explained what it means to be a state-owned entity (SOE), the funding of these projects and how the National Department of Transport mandates the SOE to use the allocated funding to deliver a safe, efficient, reliable and affordable national road transport system to benefit the people of South Africa.
“Being an SOE means the government funds Sanral and the money comes from the people of South Africa. This funding is used to plan, maintain and rehabilitate national roads within the framework of government policy. The people should be included in that process of infrastructure development,” said Mhambi.
“While Sanral builds national roads, we make sure the community members get job opportunities in the road infrastructure development and benefit from it. Over and above the main contractors, we also ensure that sub- contractors are selected from the local area to help build and maintain the national roads. The board of Sanral is part of the “Taking Sanral to the people” session in Merafong to ensure that the local people and businesses get those opportunities,” said Mhambi.
The executive mayor of Merafong, Mogomotsi Sello, said he welcomed Sanral’s initiative of engaging with the people and businesses at a local level.
