Created By Dji Camera
musewu

The Nsipe-Chin­geni-Liwonde Road project, ‑a crit­i­cal infra­struc­ture ini­tia­tive, which is expect­ed to con­tribute to region­al inte­gra­tion and trade facil­i­ta­tion for Malawi, Mozam­bique, and Zam­bia, is sig­nif­i­cant­ly pro­gress­ing well now that the con­trac­tor has not only moved in but also has start­ed mobilizing.

Addi­tion­al­ly, com­pen­sa­tion of the project Affect­ed peo­ple (PAPs) has been com­plet­ed. This means that all 833 PAPs have been paid. “The first round of assess­ment that was done had iden­ti­fied 833 PAPs, and all these have been sort­ed, how­ev­er, with the new designs there are pos­si­bil­i­ties of hav­ing more PAPs and these will be sort­ed after fur­ther assess­ments and ver­i­fi­ca­tion has been con­clud­ed,” said project coor­di­na­tor Patrick Kamanga.

The ADB pol­i­cy on com­pen­sa­tion ensures that when peo­ple have vol­un­tar­i­ly been dis­placed, they are treat­ed equi­tably and share in the ben­e­fits of the project that involves their reset­tle­ment. The pol­i­cy aims to ensure that dis­rup­tion to the liveli­hoods of peo­ple in the project area is avoid­ed or at least min­imised, and that the dis­placed per­sons receive reset­tle­ment assis­tance to improve their liv­ing standards.

 This also pro­vides guid­ance to Bank staff and bor­row­ers, and sets up a mech­a­nism for mon­i­tor­ing the per­for­mance of the reset­tle­ment pro­grammes. Most impor­tant­ly, it requires the prepa­ra­tion of a Reset­tle­ment Action Plan (RAP) under a devel­op­ment approach that address­es issues of the liveli­hood and liv­ing stan­dards of the dis­placed per­sons as well as com­pen­sa­tion for loss of assets, using a par­tic­i­pa­to­ry approach at all stages of project design and implementation.

Kaman­ga fur­ther added that com­pen­sa­tion for project affect­ed peo­ple has been run­ning smooth­ly and that there were no seri­ous griev­ances that is why the process was com­plet­ed with­in the sched­uled time. 

Many of those being com­pen­sat­ed include indi­vid­u­als whose liveli­hoods depend on road­side busi­ness­es. Typ­i­cal busi­ness­es along the road include small shops, food stalls, car­pen­try work­shops and mar­ket ven­dors sell­ing goods like fresh pro­duce and sec­ond-hand clothes. The project has also affect­ed fruit tree own­ers, as some trees were uproot­ed or became inac­ces­si­ble due to construction.

Despite progress, some chal­lenges per­sist. The gov­ern­ment is work­ing to ensure that all eli­gi­ble indi­vid­u­als includ­ing those with undoc­u­ment­ed claims are account­ed for. For those who have not yet received com­pen­sa­tion, author­i­ties have assured the pub­lic of their com­mit­ment to com­plet­ing the process prompt­ly and fairly.

The Msipe-Chin­geni-Liwonde Road Project is part of the Multi­na­tion­al Nacala Road Cor­ri­dor Devel­op­ment Project Phase V. This phase includes the reha­bil­i­ta­tion of a 55 km stretch of road between Nsipe and Liwonde, as well as the con­struc­tion of a One-Stop Bor­der Post (OSBP) at Chiponde, which will enhance cross-bor­der trade between Malawi and Mozambique.