South Africa’s national roads need over $17 billion of repairs

South Africa, which already faces a heavy bill to upgrade its port, rail and electricity infrastructure, needs 307 billion rand ($17.2 billion) to repair and improve its sprawling national road system.

The South African National Roads Agency SOC Ltd. requires design and construction work on 1,437 projects, Transport Minister Barbara Creecy said in a presentation to lawmakers in Cape Town on Tuesday.

Repair work by the company, which manages 4% of the nation’s 750,000-kilometer (466,000-mile) road network, has been dogged by delays caused by challenges ranging from contractors going out of business to extortion by organized crime, Creecy said.

Firms brought in to complete the work when a contractor quit due to demands by criminals have included China Communications Construction Co., she said.

South Africa’s road network is the 11th-longest in the world, while Sanral’s small portion of that carries 70% of the nation’s long-distance freight. The costly outlook reflects similar projections for other state-owned companies.

Power utility Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. faces a 390 billion-rand upgrade of the electricity grid to add more generation from clean-energy sources. Transnet SOC Ltd. needs to spend billions to improve signalling systems and repair trains that are inoperable without spare parts.

Provincial road projects have design and construction budgets averaging about 17 billion rand annually through 2027, the presentation showed, along with a more extensive list of incomplete, abandoned and delayed projects.

Creecy recommended support for the transport department “through leadership reform within the police to reinforce governance structure” and strengthening project monitoring.