Minister of Housing and Infrastructure Development, Ronald Chitotela is leading a high-level team to Johannesburg, South Africa to conclude bilateral negotiations and technical meetings regarding the Kasomeno – Mwenda Road between Zambia and Democratic Republic of Congo.
The project which is a public- private-partnership project will serve a dual purpose, firstly, to formally present the findings of the feasibility studies and secondly, to finalize the MOU/Bilateral agreement presented in Kinshasa on October 29th, 2018.
The project was approved by Cabinet in 2015.
At the meeting, Mr. Chitotela has called for speedy completion related to the bilateral negotiations being held between the two countries.
And Luapula Province Minister Nixon Chilangwa states that his province will benefit from the traffic that this trade route will open.
Meanwhile, Minister of Infrastructure from the DRC, Baikpon Pon said the DRC was committed to opening up its country through transport corridors being pursued by SADC.
When completed the road will serve to open a new trade corridor from Nakonde to the DRC.
The new trade route will cut the distance by about 400km from Nakonde to the Congo.
A new bridge will also be built across the Luapula River at Kashiba.
Zambian has done the largest extent of this stretch through the Link-Zambia 8000 project which include, the Nakonde-Mbala-Kasama stretch and the Kasama- Luwingu-Mansa road.
This project envisions to finish the last stretch from Chipili-Kashiba across the Luapula and to Kasomeno in the DRC.