The Contractor for the construction of the Polihali Dam was introduced to various stakeholders at a meeting held at the Mokhotlong District Administrator’s office premises on Wednesday.
The contractor and a team of consultants were introduced to stakeholders by the Polihali Branch Operations Manager, Mr. Gerard Mokone and the introduction is a follow-up to the awarding of the contract by the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority earlier this month.
In his brief remarks, Mr. Mokone said construction of the Polihali Dam will be led by a Chinese company called SUN Joint Venture comprised of a number of construction and consultant companies.
He said LHDA is guided by the principle of transparency and therefore urged the contractor to be transparent and share information about opportunities coming with the dam construction.
Mr. Mokone added that it is the LHDA culture to introduce the contractor when engaged before they can actually start the work.
He assured them that they will be provided with the necessary support and security so that the environment can be conducive for the successful execution of their work in the second phase of the (Lesotho Highlands Water Project) with the Polihali Dam construction being the main component of this project.
The Project Manager, Mr. Chris Hall for the Matla a Metsi Joint Venture said the construction of the dam will be supervised under the joint venture of four companies from Lesotho, South Africa and France.
He said construction of the dam is expected to start in January next year and will end after five years.
Mr. Hall mentioned that they will have 200 Chinese people on the site, who will be supervising engineers adding that 2000 labourers will be engaged in the construction works.
Polihali Dam is a concrete-faced rockfill dam, like the Mohale Dam which was constructed in Phase I of the LHWP. It will create a reservoir on the Senqu and Khubelu rivers with a surface area of 5 053 hectares. The infrastructure also includes a spillway, a compensation outlet structure and a mini-hydropower station.
The dam will be built within the Malingoaneng Constituency in the Mokhotlong district.
According to LHDA, the contract amount for the Polihali Dam is approximately M7.68 billion.
