By Ken Afor
Nigeria’s Minister of Works, Dave Umahi, has announced that rehabilitation and palliative work on all federal roads that had deteriorated will begin on Saturday, December 1, 2023.
According to Umahi who made this known on Monday in a post on his verified X account, the repair work became necessary following complaints of commuters and residents of the poor condition of federal roads.
The affected roads include the Makurdi-Nsukka-9th Mile Road, East-West Road, Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway, Benin bypass road, collapsed bridges of Enugu-Port Harcourt road, collapsed bridges of Shandam-Plateau State, Abuja-Kaduna- Zaria-Kano road and Gombe-Bauchi among others.
He vowed to directly address concerns regarding road infrastructure, regardless of the hefty amount of debt carried over from many of the current road projects.
He said: “The attention of the Federal Ministry of Works has been drawn to the concerns of the public on the deplorable situations of some sections of the federal roads throughout the federation as reported in many media platforms, especially social media and newspaper pages.”
He stated that N300bn allocated in the 2023 supplementary budget is to be separated into N100bn for immediate road repairs in all 36 States and the Federal Capital Territory, and the remaining N200bn to complete existing projects in the works, providing relief to Nigerians.
His words: “Without prejudice to all the good efforts of the past administration on road infrastructure development which they tackled within the limit of their resources, the work to be done to change the ugly state of our roads is quite enormous.
“Mr. President is not complaining of the challenges he inherited in nearly all sectors of the economy, especially as it concerns our road infrastructure and he has directed that works in those palliative projects must commence before 1st December 2023, while observing all due process.
“On the sections being frequently complained of by the public in all regions of the North and South of the country, Mr. President has equally isolated them and directed immediate actions on them and indeed work has started on all such roads. The public can crosscheck our claims and report back to us.”
Umahi, the immediate past Governor of Ebonyi State appealed to the general public for their help in monitoring contractors working on the palliative works of road infrastructure, expressing his intention to recognise those providing genuine information in a public forum.
The Minister strongly encouraged that any poorly constructed roads should be photographed, their details reported (name of contractor, location, type of contract and defects observed) and forwarded to one of the following contacts: 08030986263, 08037086137, or 08106423197.
Further according to him, “The public is hereby requested to assist the Federal Ministry of Works and FERMA by supervising the contractors that will be engaged in these palliative works and indeed all ongoing projects. It is the right of every Nigerian to have value for their money deployed to the road infrastructure sector and therefore must show both interest and passion in all the ongoing projects. All poorly constructed roads should be photographed and reported immediately to the following contacts: 08030986263, 08037086137, or 08106423197; showing the name of the contractor, the location and type of contract and defects observed.
“The Federal Ministry of Works will document such reports, verify and take effective action to correct such infractions. The Ministry shall also periodically recognise publicly those who made such reports that are genuine in a public engagement forum to be hosted quarterly and will sanction such erring contractors publicly too.”
The Minister made it clear that the federal government had not outrightly restricted the use of asphalt in road building and had never instructed that only concrete should be used for all road construction projects in the nation.
However, he announced a policy that supplies rules concerning the use of concrete and asphalt in pavement building projects across the nation.
Contractors for all ongoing projects are given the option of either continuing to use asphalt or having their projects redesigned on concrete without incurring additional costs to the government, as per the new policy.
“On the use of asphalt: contractors shall stick to only a 5 per cent Variation on Price in line with the signed contract agreement throughout the project and the signed contract shall not be subject to review, especially on bituminous items.
“The thickness of the asphalt pavement as designed must be strictly adhered to by all such contractors and the design shelf life for the asphalt (at least 15 years) shall be guaranteed by issuing an insurance bond through a reputable insurance company in favor of the Federal Government.
“For the use of concrete, contractors must abide by the 5 per cent VOP, and 50-year design shelf life using concrete grade 40.”
Umahi stated that anyone criticizing or expressing disapproval of the concrete technology policy are probably those who don’t have the best intentions for Nigeria; emphasizing that this policy should be supported.
“They are the same people that use adulterated bitumen in their projects while putting pressure on our Naira through the importation of adulterated bitumen instead of developing our abundant God-given bitumen deposits in Ogun State and other parts of Nigeria.
“This new policy has not violated any law and the Ministry is forging ahead with this new policy. As of today, most of the ongoing projects are still ongoing with asphalt pavement in line with this new policy while some are redesigned on concrete pavement, depending on the terrain and with full understanding of the affected contractors of those projects,” the statement concluded
