The Roads Contractor Company (RCC) said the tarring on the Uis-Henties Bay Road experienced delays due to financial challenges.

The Uis-Henties Bay road upgrade repeatedly experienced delays.

Last year in June, the former Minister of Works and Transport, John Mutorwa, visited the project and was informed about a delay due to funding.

Despite the challenges, the contractor committed to tarring 70 kilometres of the road by March 2025.

However, when the Roads Authority officials, led by CEO Conrad Lutombi, visited the project recently, that target was missed.

"It's a management issue that the contractor is not managing his teams well. These are factors in our view, which was really poor management from the contractor side."

According to the Roads Contractor Company, the government is to blame for the delay.

The Interim Chief Executive Officer of RCC, Darius Nelumbu, said funds were not availed to the parastatal until recently.

"We didn't have enough equipment. However, in terms of buying us equipment, I think the government has now committed through its budgetary allocation. We actually added additional equipment, we added additional resources in terms of human capital, and we established a second camp to make sure that these allocated teams are fully operational."

RCC, together with the subcontractor, Chinese-owned Zhong Mei, was supposed to complete tarring the 96 kilometres of the Uis-Henties road project by this year.

The government has spent N$741 million on the estimated one-billion-dollar project.

It is part of Namibia's vision to strengthen the western corridor, linking the country to southern Angola.