ARUA CITY RECIEVES TECHNICAL SUPPORT AHEAD OF INFRUSTRUCTURE PROJECT UNDER SUIDAC

Stakeholders during cities alliance mission engagement with Arua City Council at the council hall on Thursday, May 28.

By Erema George

Arua City

As plans for the infrastructural development under the SUIDAC project in Arua city nears its implementation stage with its date not yet disclosed, cities alliance the implementing partner of the SUIDAC project has provided technical support for Arua city to ensure quality of works.

The SUIDAC  projects infrastructure development component includes, construction of a general ward in Adumi health center iv, expanding and equipping primary and secondary school infrastructure in Arua City particularly in Arua, Onduparaka,and Ociba primary schools and Arua public secondary school as well as putting a satellite shade at Dadamu market.

Philip Maina Gatongi, a senior urban specialist with Cities alliance advices that procuring a good contractor will ensure a better quality of works.

“Quality is a process. We need to make sure we procure a good contractor who has good qualified people. We need ensure he has good quality materials not second hand and we need to ensure he doesn’t give us what we call knock offs or fake materials.” Gatongi Advised

“Your taps need to be original or good quality, your lights need to be good quality, so it starts from the procurement of a contractor to the cite supervision.” He added noting that ignoring things like the door handle, windows and glasses, the kind of ceiling, the kind of nails used on cite during quality control affects quality of works.

Philip Maina Gatongi, a senior urban specialist with Cities alliance technically guiding participants.

Additionally, cities alliance in-country coordinator Mara Forbes noted that infrastructure serves as a key indicator of projects in communities.

“As you know, infrastructure is what really shows impact to communities. When they see things being built, they see services being improved, it helps build morale and keep things moving.” Mara noted, highlighting a need for better quality of work on the projects.

Cities alliance in-country coordinator Mara Forbes, during the mission engagement.

Meanwhile stakeholders in the city have advocated for their involvement in the project work to ensure smooth implementation of the project;

Arua city deputy mayor, his worship Jackson Dratibi says;

“It’s a good practice that cite meetings must really be very important and the politicians should be involved to understand what is taking place, what is the next stage to come so that they will be part of the success when it comes to the end of the project.” Dratibi said.

On a similar note, the executive director of WN CARD, John Daniel Andruga advocated for the involvement of the city council and CBOs for better monitoring.

“The engineers can share the design with the city council and the CBOs so that we as we go and do monitoring, we shall be able to see this is the design, this is what it is supposed to take, I mean the monitoring part of it is very important.” Andruga commented.

The senior inspector of schools for Arua City Buza Zilly expressed concerns over the safety of the pupils, saying the presence of the pupils at school may affect the smooth progress of work urging for a solution to avoid being affected in one way or the other.

Inadequate early planning, poor cash flow management and miscommunication are among factors that lead to failure of projects.