RELI Assets Holding Company (RAHCO) yesterday demolished the remaining buildings within the railway line reserve areas from Dar es Salaam city centre to Pugu, which had earlier been skipped due to court injunctions.
Speaking to the ‘Sunday News’ in the
city yesterday, RAHCO Public Relations Manager, Ms Catherine Moshi, said
they have been carrying out the exercise since early this month, among
other reasons to give way for the construction of a Standard Gauge
Railway (SGR) line.
The ‘Sunday News’ witnessed the
demolition being carried out under tight security at Kamata area and
Gapco Service Station was one of the premises brought down.
“We could not demolish them earlier when
we carried out the exercise as there were court injunctions. The stop
orders were effective six months from July, last year and owners did not
file new ones that gives us authority to continue with the exercise,”
she explained.
She said that the exercise will take
three to four days due to shortage of demolishing equipment and
sensitivity in demolishing storey buildings. Last week, between 250 and
300 houses, mostly kiosks were demolished along the railway line to pave
the way for construction of the Standard Gauge line.
A consortium of Turkish and Portugal
companies won the tender to construct the first phase of the country’s
SGR from Dar es Salaam to Morogoro, a stretch of some 205km,beating 39
other bidders after meeting both technical and financial criteria for
implementation of the project.
The SGR is part of a 1,216km stretch
that will eventually link Dar es Salaam with the rest of the country as
well as with Rwanda and Burundi. The government allocated 1tri/- (about
$450 million) during the 2016/17 financial year.
The planned SGR line is expected to
improve regional trade links and help boost the economy in Tanzania and
the landlocked neighbouring countries.
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