Upper Wage gets new steel bridge

By ANDREW ALPHONSE
MORE than 30,000 people of the remote Upper Wage local level government area in Margarima district of Hela now have a new steel bridge across the Tape river.
Komo-Margarima district administrator Tumbi Yari thanked Hela Governor Anderson Agiru and Komo-Margarima MP Francis Potape for funding the bridge and the new Yuhama-Tundaga to Panduaka road in the Upper Wage area.
Yari said apart from the dilapidated roads, the Upper Wage people were struggling with “wet crossings and log bridges’’ for many years across the Tape river.
This would be a thing of the past.
Yari said people marvelled at the sight of the new steel bridge that provided vehicles and people comfortable crossing.
He thanked local construction firm Niugini Star Transport Ltd (NSTL) for its work.
Upper Wage LLG president Hape Merelia, the chairman of Works in the Hela provincial assembly, heaped praise on Agiru, Potape and the national government through the Department of National Planning for funding the road and three bridges.
Merelia urged his people to embrace these new developments in their area and stop unnecessarily holding projects to ransom like demanding unrealistic compensation payments.
NSTL project supervisor Ignatius Torwang said it was a challenging experience for the firm to finally build the bridge.
He said the company had to endure bad weather, unnecessary delays, landowner issues, tough and remote geographical conditions to finally get the bridge across the river.