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O País
The proposed Metropolitan Agency will coordinate the transport routes between the municipalities of Maputo, Matola and Boane
The Ministry of Transport and Communications will soon submit to the Council of Ministers a proposal to create a metropolitan agency that will coordinate transport routes between the municipalities of Maputo, Matola and Boane, Minister of Transport and Communications Carlos Mesquita disclosed yesterday at his ministry’s 35th Coordinating Council.
Minister Mesquita says that the proposal for the creation of the agency is part of a package of measures that his ministry intends to implement to address the problem of passenger transport in Maputo. The minister acknowledges that the transport system is a problem that will not only be overcome by the purchase of buses alone, but also requires a structural reform of the sector.
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The metropolitan agency will have the task of drawing up agreements that facilitate urban mobility. “The agency will be a small organisation that will coordinate public passenger transport. The city of Maputo and Matola and Boane have municipalities with responsibility for this, and each municipality has a territory. To go from one territory to another requires agreements and this organisation will be in charge of the agency,” the minister explained.
Along with the proposed agency, Mesquita enumerated the other measures that his ministry had been implementing to solve the transport problem.
Chapa price hike unavoidable – but quality on its way
“A tender for the concession of routes and issue of ticketing was recently launched. Work is under way on the provision of maintenance and technical assistance services for buses. We have been discussing with the Mozambican Federation of Road Transport Workers and other stakeholders how better to organise the issue of transporters’ subsidies, which were recently converted to the acquisition of buses,” Mesquita said.
Tariff adjustments and the consequent price hike are unavoidable, but the government insists that the increase will be accompanied improvements in service, reports O País.
“The rates currently in force are 7 and 9 meticais. We think that there is room for an adjustment. But this readjustment must always be made in order to bring about improvements and it is in this perspective that the Government has been thinking. We have discussed this in depth,” the minister concluded.
The transport system is one of the topics to be discussed in the XXXV Coordinating Council of the Ministry, which will also evaluate the implementation of the Government’s Five Year Plan and the Economic and Social Plan of 2017.
Ways to generate more revenue for the state will also be considered.
The council , which ended today, was held under the motto: “For a system of transport, communications and meteorology, safe and accessible” and brings together staff of the ministry, public companies linked to the sector, and other institutions.
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