When the Southern Africa Railways Sports Cultural Organisation (Sarsco) held its annual games at the University of Swaziland the last weekend of July, talk amongst the railway executives of the region was about the host country. The R17-billion rail link planned from Western Swaziland through Mpumalanga Province en route to Gauteng is the largest regional rail undertaking since 1976. 400 CEOs, directors and employees of the national rail companies that are members of the Southern African Railway Association (Sara) attended the Sarsco games to play netball, soccer, table tennis and volleyball, using these exertions as excuses to network and share information. That the big Swaziland-SA rail undertaking was the centre of conversation came as no surprise to the host country. Stephenson Ngubane, Acting CEO of Swaziland Railway, which is partnering with Transnet Freight Rail on the ‘Swazilink’, told FTW: “It is a big project. The early stages of the process are being implemented, and the physical part (of construction) is a year away, after design and the financial transactions, but all is on schedule.” What he calls “scaling up for a big project” involves groundwork for a route that will eliminate the need for Gauteng to Maputo rail traffic to skirt around the bulk of Swaziland via Komatipoort. Unlike road freight that is still restricted from using the more direct route through Swaziland on a 24/7 basis because of nightly border post closures, rail traffic will be able to move at all hours. “We are dealing with mountainous terrain (for the route), and there will be a number of bridges,” said Ngubane. However, there is no reason at this point to doubt the target date for the route’s opening will be met – late 2016 or the first quarter of 2017. Before his retirement this year, long-serving Swaziland Railway CEO Gideon Mahlalela said: “I have been working toward the dream of this route for years. It will bring a big boost for rail traffic in Swaziland because most of that is transit rail traffic from South Africa.” In fact, a “western rail route” through Swaziland from SA has been sought since 1882, said Mahlalela. Swaziland will pony up R5 billion of the project’s budget.
