By Sikhulile Dlamini
MBABANE – With the Tebe Tebe (footbridge) projects making strides in Eswatini communities, the Ministry of Economic Planning and Development hosted a meet and greet session with international students from Engineers In Action (EIA) on Monday (June 3, 2024).
The session took place at the Ministry’s conference room where students from abroad universities were introduced to the Principal Secretary (PS) of the Ministry of Economic Planning and Development Thabsile Mlangeni and shared their progress with the construction of footbridges and piloting of the water project in the country.
Anna Jovanovic project manager for the footbridge (Tebe Tebe) project highlighted that since 2017 they have hosted over 160 students in the country from different universities in US, Canada and UK and they look forward to welcoming more in the coming years.
We aim to build seven new bridges two of which has already been completed. One of our greatest successes to date was the construction of a suspension bridge in Gege Inkhundla last month. It was a first ever staff-built suspension bridge completed by our local staff who had received trainings through EIA programs in Rwanda and Eswatini,” she said.
The PS Thabsile Mlangeni extended a warm welcome to the students and further thanked the collaboration of Micro projects and EIA in developing the communities in the Kingdom of Eswatini.
“So far I got a report from Microprojects that of all the bridges that have been done by the EIA, none of them has required repairing since 2017 when the program started and that means we are doing quality work,” she said.
Since the beginning of the program, a total investment of E18 million has been spent by the EIA, with plans to invest an additional E8million in 2024.
