Federal Roads

It came like a bolt out of the blue early this week, Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, issued an advertisement, which went in a completely different direction compared to what he had always said of President Muhammadu Buhari.

The lawmaker representing Badagry Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives, Rep. Babatunde Hunpe, on Sunday assured residents of the town that palliative work would soon start on the bad section of Lagos-Badagry Expressway.

Most of our 36 States Governors have so far done well in measures to combat COVID 19 and must be commended. Most of them, are leading by example and that is good.

A bill to establish an agency for forest guards to man federal roads and highways scaled second reading in the House of Representatives on Thursday.

Gov. Dapo Abiodun of Ogun has called on the Federal Government to declare a state of emergency on federal roads in the country.

Bauchi state government has said it will establish a road maintenance agency for the State to complement the efforts of the Federal government in the rehabilitation and maintenance of some major state roads in Bauchi state.

Akwa Ibom State says that it has no obligation ploughing back the money refunded to it by the Federal Government for constructing federal roads in its domain to construct other federal roads.

The House of Representatives has passed a bill scrapping the Federal Road Maintenance Agency (FERMA) and replaced it with a Federal Road Authority charged with the rehabilitation and maintenance of all federal roads across the country. The House also moved to establish a National Roads Fund to generate funds for the maintenance of all federal roads with a view to ensuring motorable roads across the country and take such burden away from government.

The Senate on Wednesday at the plenary mandated its Committee on Local Content to investigate reasons for the dominance of foreign vessels above locally owned and registered vessels in the domestic carriage of petroleum products within coastal inland waterways of Nigeria.

The Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, has explained that Nigerians misquoted him in his comment that the complaints about the deplorable state of federal roads across the country were exaggerated.

A member of the House of Representatives of Idanre/Ifedore Federal Constituency, Mr. Tajudeen Adefisoye, urged the Minister of Works, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, to declare a state of emergency on all federal roads in the country.

A joint committee of the National Assembly, on Wednesday, directed the Managing Director of the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA), Nurudeen Rafindadi, and other directors of the agency to go and compile a list of all the dilapidated federal roads in the six geo-political zones of the country.

Some Anambra lawmakers and the State Ministry of Works on Wednesday decried the low budgetary allocated to road infrastructure in the state.

Senate President Ahmad Lawan in Tuesday urged President Muhammadu Buhari to declare a state of emergency on federal roads.

The Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra has said it will not allow the Federal Government to set up tollgates in the South-East.

The Federal Government has asked state governors not to fix federal roads if they will eventually demand refund for the rehabilitation.

In spite of the efforts of intervention bodies such as the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA), many federal roads across the country remain in deplorable condition, a survey has indicated.

Some stakeholders have lamented the deplorable state of federal roads in their respective areas, saying the situation is adversely affecting the socio-economic lives of the people.