By Moses Nyirenda
Lilongwe, Mana: Minister of Local Government, Professor Blessings Chinsinga has said that his ministry is committed to creating smart and sustainable cities that would help in advancing the social-economic growth of the country.
The minister made the remarks on Wednesday when he toured some of the developments including roads construction projects that are being carried out by Lilongwe City Council (LCC) in the city of Lilongwe.
Chinsinga said that smart and sustainable cities have the potential to contribute more in improving the social-economic growth of the country.
“As part of our transforming agenda, we want cities that are smart and sustainable; we mean the cities that can withstand the effects of climate change such as floods.
“Looking at the existing statistics, cities in the country contribute about 33 percent in the social-economic growth of the country, for this reason we want to improve our cities in order to assist more in social-economic transformation and prosperity of the country,” Chinsinga said.
He therefore commended LCC for its projects that being implemented in Lilongwe city saying that they are in line with Ministry of Local Government’s plans.
“Looking at the projects which the Lilongwe City Council is currently undertaking in Lilongwe city, it shows that the council has meaningful transformation agenda and this is fully in line with our plans as the ministry,” he said.
In his comment, Lilongwe city Mayor, Richard Banda said that Lilongwe city has the infrastructure challenge; hence the council is working tirelessly to address the challenge.
“The city council has a lot of challenges about infrastructure within its locality, therefore as the council we are working on the ground to address the challenge by improving the infrastructure such as roads and currently we have already completed constructing some roads within the city.
“We have the vision that at the end of our projects we will have better infrastructure in our city,” Banda explained.
LCC is currently working on 26 projects in Lilongwe city with a budget line of K12.9 billion for all projects, according to the Mayor.
