90 new buses arrive at border

A batch of 90 new Golden Dragon buses arrived at Beitbridge Border Post yesterday enroute to Harare for Zupco, taking the number of buses delivered by Government this year to more than 500.

The new buses were imported from China via Durban.

By the end of the day yesterday, the buses were parked at a truck stop near Shell Service Station at the South African side of the border pending the finalisation of the clearance processes.

“We expect the buses to cross into Zimbabwe by Thursday morning en-route to Harare,” said a Zimbabwean border official.

“We are using the pre-clearance facility to ensure that when they arrive on our component of the border, we only check them for compliance. This is done to avoid border congestion.”

Zupco acting chief executive Mr Evaristo Mudangwa said the batch should be in Harare this week.

The last batch of 50 buses was delivered in September.

Each bus is sold at over US$50 000 in China.
The Government has since reaffirmed its commitment to ease transport challenges by availing reliable and affordable transport to the people in line with Vision 2030.

A few weeks ago Zupco entered into a deal with the National Railways of Zimbabwe to service peak period services in Bulawayo, Gweru and Harare. The five 10-carriage trains can carry 5 000 passengers, roughly the equivalent of 70 buses.

Besides the growing number of Zupco buses, private buses and kombis have been franchised to build up the Zupco fleet.-The Herald