THE Choiseul Bay Township Project (CBTP) is progressing well, says Choiseul Province (CP) CBTP Project Manager Isaac Lekelalu.
It was reported that Lekelalu is taking on each development phase head-on in an ambitious township relocation project of our time in the country.
Undergoing planning phase many years ago the project was recently initiated by the Government and faced many hurdles through the years.
However, according to Lekelalu as the project manager, the CBTP is a priority project of the current Choiseul provincial government.
Lekelalu is also said to fully support the relocation of Choiseul’s capital township from Taro Island.
Meanwhile, land acquisition efforts had begun around twenty (20) years ago with negotiations being down between government officials and the Choiseul Bay Trust board (CBTB).
Ending in a successful transfer of land title to the CPG after many years, the CBT project continued on to complete most of its sub-division plan in 2019. This covers a two Lot area over five hundred hectors of land.
In December 2019, the final sub-division designs for the larger of the two areas Lot 277 with over four hundred hectors were handed to the project manager designating it to host the new capital township of Choiseul Province.
As the new home to Choiseul’s government administration centre, commercial and residential sites the plan has seen through the survey design of four hundred and sixty sub-divisions at this stage.
This comes with the hopes of securing finance from the National Government as well as the Provincial Government as they are looking forward to continuing on with the ground survey phase of placing boundary mark pegs – to indicate road networks and other sites.
According to Lekelalu, more work is expected to be done it Lot 9 – the smaller of the two Lots that of which the well known Choiseul Bay Secondary School is located.
But the school itself will be sacrificing its long known location as it is expected to also be relocated to give way to the proposed national port project catering to the growth of a future township.
Taro Island has long been the capital of Choiseul Province hosting its Government administration and commercial activities over the years. But the issue of expansion has become an obstruction to future development plans for the province as the island is only 1.5 square kilometers.
Originally a coconut plantation island, it has proved to be disaster-prone especially with rising sea levels threatening its shores.
Traditionally known as ‘Tarekukure’ and better known today as Choiseul Bay, the move will ensure that Choiseul will have more room to develop.
In the meantime, Choiseul Province and its Government backed by the National Government continue to support a project that has not been seen done for many years.
Its success would speak for us as a Nation in our ability (as the saying goes) to move mountains.
By TERENCE ZIRU
in Gizo
