The bridge comes to boost socio-economic activities between the two countries.
On Monday, March 4, 2024, the Ministers for the Environment and Infrastructure, respectively, paid a joint visit to Transversale 6 in the Buganda commune of Cibitoke province, where the bridge over the Rusizi River between Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is being rebuilt.
The aim of the visit was to see how the work was progressing.
“We know that the start of work was delayed by lengthy negotiations linked to the planned budget, which was lower than the current market budget. Also, safety-related activities took up a lot of our time”.
“Once we had answered all the questions related to these parameters, the work began. We’re satisfied, but with a nuance”, said Prosper Dodiko, Minister in charge of the environment.
The work has reached a completion rate of 15%, while the time taken represents 32%. There has already been a delay due to start-up work involving the assembly of materials imported from Uganda for the construction of the temporary bridge.
“Now, all the conditions are in place to accelerate and, above all, make up for this small delay,” said Dodiko.
According to Dieudonné Dukundane, Minister in charge of infrastructures, the final bridge will be erected, and the transitional bridge is merely a facility so that engineers and technicians can have access to this waterway when they fix the final structures.
It’s a cross-border bridge insofar as at the border, there are immigration, customs and hygiene services that need to be sheltered on both sides, and even the passengers who will be using this infrastructure will need parking spaces for their vehicles to take shelter.
“These are components that were not foreseen in the initial project, but we think it’s worth starting to think about them now,” said Minister Dukundane.
There is also the access road on both sides, that is 3.5 kilometers on the Burundian side and 11 km on the DRC side.
“We’ve already started thinking about practical ways of making these access roads as passable as possible, to avoid such an investment being built for pedestrians or cyclists. Our teams from the Agence Routière and the Office Burundais de l’Habitat will be reinforcing the existing teams for greater synergy and results”, said Dieudonné Dukundane.
