There is some confusion over who is responsible for the upgrade and development of the Highlands Highway with media reports stating recently the PNG LNG project developers want to spend K2 billion on rehabilitating the Highlands Highway.
Though we know that this was an error in the reporting and that the project developers are not or nor will be involved in funding the fixing and upgrading the Highlands Highway, it does make you think that maybe a private developer with immense commercial interest at stake at the end of the highway in the Southern Highlands may just be the right organization to oversee the development and rehabilitation of Papua New Guinea's most important highway.
Exxon Mobil staff recently briefed current Works Minister Peter O’Neil on their feasibility studies on the costs and engineering involved in repairing and upgrading the highway.
In the study, the total cost was estimated at $US1 Billion.
It is now up to the State and its development partners AusAID and the World Bank to get the roads up to standard.
But will the State and Development Partners deliver?
In previous years, millions have been spent on the Highlands Highway but it seems wasted efforts as the road gets worse and worse every year. Though many of the contractors seem to have got more successful as the Highlands Highway they were/are working on deteriorates.
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