Luanda, Angola, 01 March – Angola’s basic road network, which has over 25,000 kilometers of roads, should be entirely rebuilt by 2008, a time when the new national road plan will also be concluded, said Angola’s public works minister, Higino Carneiro, Tuesday.

According to Carneiro, speaking at the closure of the Widened Consultation Council of the Public Works Ministry, “the stabilization of credit lines, namely from China, Brazil, Germany and Portugal, opens up good prospects to present a more significant level of construction work.”

In terms of the new national road plan, Carneiro said that he would allow new stretches of road to be opened, but emphasized that, “they should appear based on the emergence of new population centers to areas where current roads do not reach.”

In mid 2005, the Angolan government approved the Executive Program for Rehabilitating National Roads within the Basic Network, which outlined the carrying out of work on around 1,200 kilometers of road network by the end of 2006, at a total cost of US$190 million.

Angola’s basic road network includes around 25,000 kilometers of roads, and it is estimated that 80 percent of these are in very poor condition or even destroyed due to the country’s civil war and a lack of maintenance. (macauhub)