A typical British dual carriageway (source Wikipedia)
Towards the end of last year, a fatal head-on collision accident, somewhere in Ntcheu on the M1 road, claimed the life of one of my best friends, Piyasoni Kachepatsonga. When I heard the news of his death, I was so shaken. Up to now I still do not understand why Piya had to leave this world in that way. More than 40 years after independence, we should have had a dual carriageway on the M1, Malawi’s main intercity road by now. The occurrence of head-on collision accidents on this road should have been history by now.
Whenever I talk about the need for us, Malawians, to start looking into how we can build a dual carriageway from Chitipa to Nsanje, most of the people that I talk to say we cannot do it because Malawi is poor. As I write, there is literally nothing happening on the ground in order to build this dual carriageway (correct me if I am wrong). Instead, what we hear is that the former president Bakili Muluzi, who is trying to retire from retirement, is castigating president Bingu wa Mutharika on the newly-rehabilitated Masauko Chipembere Highway in Blantyre, claiming Mutharika messed the original plans of having an overhead road above the highway. And Mutharika’s aide, Henry Chimunthu Banda, has hit back at Bakili Muluzi, saying it was Muluzi himself who rejected the idea in 2000 because it was too costly.
Although Chimunthu Banda seems to have the facts while Muluzi doesn’t, I am of the view that we do not need flyover roads as of now in Malawi. What we need is a dual carriageway from Chitipa to Nsanje! We are losing a lot of people on the M1 road through head-on collision accidents. I am not trying to suggest that all the accidents on this road are caused by head-on collisions but I am sure most of them are. If we can put our heads together and work for our nation and our people, we will not only build this dual carriageway but we will accomplish a lot of achievements e.g. replacing the Ilala and Mtendele vessels on Lake Malawi with new ones. The key is unity. Regardless of our political affiliations, we need to unite for the common good. The political rivalries in Malawi are only for a time. Those of you who have followed Malawi politics for sometime can agree with me that our politicians change like chameleons. There are no permanent enemies or friends in Malawi politics. One cannot tell how the political landscape will be after this year’s general elections. Our politicians call each other bad names today, tomorrow you see them dining and wining together while the masses that give them the political leverage are dying.
Malawi’s first president, Ngwazi, Dr Hastings Kamuzu Banda used to teach us that apart from the classroom environment, the process of learning can also be accomplished through travel (kuphunzira si sukulu yokha komanso kuyenda). In September 2007, when I traveled to Namibia for the IEEE Africon Conference, I learnt something which the authorities in Malawi can implement on the M1 road as we work towards the dual carriageway. The Nambians also have single carriageway from the Hosea Kutako International Airport to Windhoek City Centre but they have widened it in specific places to cater for those who are in hurry and want to overtake other cars.
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16 users commented in " A dual carriageway from Chitipa to Nsanje is needed in Malawi "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a Trackbacki LOVE the idea of a chitipa – nsanje dual carriage way!! last week my car did not pass its certificate-of-fitness at lilongwe road traffic, the guy i sent to organise it just made some calls and got the certificate anyway. my car seems fit but thats another story… my point is there are many factors contributing to the tragic number of people who die on our roads. malawi seems to be more advanced than some other african countries (eg uganda) in the quality of our roads – the lakeshore road is quite good. perhaps we should explore other possible ways to reduce the death toll.
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Clement Nyirenda says:
January 11th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
So we have better roads than Uganda. This is news to me. But I think that we do not have to feel contented with that if we are to compete globally. We have a long way to go. Apart from preventing head-on collisions, the dual carriage way will make driving from one city to another fast and enjoyable.
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Sorry to hear about your friend.
The best way to get what you’re after is to lobby the appropriate authorities as much as you can. Get as many people as you can and lobby, lobby, lobby. Do not stop until they give you what you want. The more people you can get involved the sooner you’ll have success. It wont happen overnight but it will happen.
I hope you get what you’re after.
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I don’t know much about Malawi, but the reason poor is not a strong one. Maybe, they should put up a speed limit and highlight the area with big notice and frequent road blocks. There are several ways to avoid accidents. Most of it depends on the drivers.
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This is my first visit here Clement. I hope to learn a lot from you about Malavi. I shall catch up with some of your earlier posts too and may be even leave a comment or two.
Road building is an investment for the betterment of any area. There are facilities available from the World Bank and other aid agencies to finance such activities in developing countries. Infra structure improvement will only add to economic growth and I hope that the powers in your country, listen to you.
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I was about to mention the Windhoek – Airport road and it’s dual lanes in certain sections. That would be a solution. However having the whole road a dual lane … not too sure!
You may note that the Road from Windhoek – Swakopmund – Walvis Baai is not dual lane. Most section of the Musina – Johannesburg – Bloemfontein are not either yet they are very busy roads and long stretches of road.
Dual lanes are not immune to accidents. The water spray large truck and bus tyres ‘deposit’ on smaller cars when overtaking in dual lanes in rainy seasons are credited for a number of fatal accidents too!
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Clement Nyirenda says:
January 15th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
@Austin: Yes I agree, dual lanes are not immune to accidents, but I am sure they help to reduce the occurrence of head-on accidents. On our current single lane, it is just too scaring for one to go into the “danger zone” whenever he wants to overtake another car. Besides that dual lanes make driving faster and more enjoyable. If my memory serves me right, the Musina-Johannesburg road has dual lanes. I cannot comment on the Johannesburg-Bloemfontein road but the Johannesburg-Durban one has dual lanes as well. It is always a great joy to travel in those roads.
Rome was not built in one day. We can start by building a dual carriageway between Lilongwe and Blantyre. With the development of the Shire-Zambezi Waterway, it will be easy to extend it from Blantyre to Nsanje. From Lilongwe it can be extended to Kasungu in one phase then Mzimba, Mzuzu, Karonga and finally Chitipa. But for this to happen, we need a strategic plan as a nation and that all of us must work toward that plan regardless of our political affiliation. Where do we see our country, in terms of infrastructure, education, population, health, economy etc, in 30 years’ time? We are so occupied with “wars” between party leaders. The Shire-Zambezi Waterway seems to be a nice project but if the current government loses the May elections, I doubt if it will continue. The new guys will think that by continuing it, all the praise will go to the Bingu administration. They will come up with their own projects which will also be discontinued by the next government.
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I agree that being poor isn’t a sufficient reason.
Working with others in low socio-economic area can have it’s advantages. People in such areas are usually hard working and passionate. If you can tap into these characteristics you can build yourself a strong army of followers.
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We need to Criss-Cross Africa. Chitipa to Nsanje is a start. CAPE to CAIRO should be the Goal
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Clement Nyirenda says:
January 15th, 2009 at 2:35 pm
@editor:That’s the way to go. A bullet train service from Cape to Cairo would also be great.
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My personal opinion is that all *major* earth paved roads (Chileka-Nkula, Lobi-Chimbiya, Ntcheu-Kasinje and others) should be upgraded to bitumen first before upgrading to dual lanes. As is the case happening now on the Zomba-Thyolo-Nsanje and other roads. Alongside that extra money pumped in irrigation, education and health care. Then we will have enough healthy, educated and well feed people to build and use the dual lane!
If I have not been misled there will be a major road from Kamuzu International Airport that goes into Area 25 (Dzenza), past Area 49 cut across into Likuni up into Area 36 and come out near the Bunda road block. All this to reroute traffic that would normally pass through town. That should buy a few more years before Kamuzu Procession Road is turned into a dual lane!!
And just as a side note some people say my views are Marxist! LOL
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This is Colleta from Malawi but resident in Ireland. I really think it will be great if Bingu would try to bring change. I know its very hard, but if he fulfills he will make up history.
At the moment am in college am studying travel and tourism with international airline studies but the moment i get in class the lectures keeps asking me if we have better roads. Malawi is a beautiful Natural Country, so many people here in Europe want to visit and do a little of charity work but they can’t due to poor roads.
The government also has to know tourism is needed in Malawi which will help us bring up our economy. the more the tourists spend the more the people will earn by promoting their businesses and others finding employment in our poor country.
Malawi come on and improve our roads.
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There is a posting on chingweshole.blogspot.com that provides some complimentary information on roads in Malawi
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What is the actual of road M1? or is M1 the name everyone calls this road in malawi? Just curious.
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Clement says:
August 26th, 2009 at 12:20 am
As far as I know, it is called M1. This is Malawi’s longest road which runs from the northern border to the southern border.The Lilongwe–Blantyre road, the busiest in the country, is part of the M1
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For your information, Zimbabwe has secured US$1 billion to transform the country’s main highway, running from the South African border in the south to the Zambian border in the north into a dual carriageway.This gives me more confidence to think that Malawi can also do it.
.-= Clement´s last blog ..Vopium, a mobile VoIP Startup from Copenhagen =-.
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