The Fiji Roads Authority (FRA) says Fiji’s roads are filled with huge potholes that are beyond repair.

Just how bad the current state is, the authority said these roads would need to be rehabilitated completely – meaning that they would need to construct new ones over the existing roads.

FRA chief executive officer Jonathan Moore, confirmed this yesterday.

Mr Moore said because of the constant rain in the past few weeks; teams had not been able to go out to the various sites to fix the roads.

He was adamant that rehabilitation would begin soon, however, budget constraints remain a setback for the authority.

Mr Moore added that $80milliion of their budget was returned to Government to help with the COVID-19 crisis.

“The roads that are already damaged with cracks, the water gets in and it gets even worse,” Mr Moore said.

“Now a perfect example is the road between Tacirua until the Australian Embassy roundabout, there are at least four or five locations along Princes Road that are really bad and are really in need of rehabilitation work because pothole repairs cannot be done.

Mr Moore said roads along Ratu Mara Road, Nabua, Princes Road, along the Suva area and other parts around the country would need to be rehabilitated.

“We had this discussion two years ago and discussion on the plans to begin the rehabilitation works, we have managed to do some that we could but because of the budgetary constraints we were able to complete them.

“These roads are beyond repairs and these roads are badly damaged, it would only last weeks if we do pothole repairs, but if we rehabilitated these roads, the life span of these roads will be 20 to 25 years.”

Edited by Caroline Ratucadra

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