Eugene Agha And Richard Amayo in Benin City
7 August 2007
Lagos — Respite seems to be on its way for travelers to the eastern part of the country as the Benin-Ore road top the list of the numerous roads and highways across the country that have been penciled down by the Federal Ministry of Transport for rehabilitation.
Towards this end over 80 percent of its resources have been deplored for the rehabilitation and repairs of the Benin Ore road.
Hundreds of thousands of Nigerians have been made to go through hell while traveling from the West to the East and from the South to the North.
The Minister of Transport, Mrs. Diezani Alison Madueke who made this known to newsmen yesterday while on a tour of the failed potion of the road the situation was a source of great discomfort and concern to the Federal Government and that was the reason why she had to come to see things for herself.
The Minister who is only two weeks in office stated that the situation had been a major course of concern to her in particular and to this ministry as a lot of Nigerians have been stock on the road under the deplorable state of the road for hours on end.
She said the Yar'Adua administration was fully committed to making the Benin-Ore axis motorable and announced that the federal government had already released more funds to the contractors for what she described as "quick surgical operation" "from what I have seen up to the Benin-Ore axis, I am disgusted, the passengers are going through terrible pains on a daily basis.
It is totally unacceptable and we need to deploy enough resources here to get this road fixed" she emphasized.
The Minister said never again will the federal government allow the roads to degenerate to deplorable conditions adding that henceforth government would facilitate proper maintenance at all levels.
Short of weeping for the country, she declared, "I am actually very, very unhappy today at what I had seen. We really have to look forward at this point. I am very displeased but there is no point looking behind us."
According to her, this sort of situation was totally acceptable and must not be allowed to continue.
"This is a major trunk road in this country and I cannot understand how it has been allowed to degenerate to this situation over a period of time because this sort of degeneration cannot happen over night. We have quickly deplored our resources and our budget from the ministry of transportation last week to allow the contractor to re-mobilized to this portion and this areas on this trunk road which are the most critically affected with the hope that we can actually get them usable through the rainy season even though it will be a temporary solution. We are trying to do is to deplore a enough resources hence to get the road useable and passable so that we do not have the sort of traffic that we are seeing here today and the sort of road diversion through the old bush road that we have seen as we are coming out>
"I was actually supposes to come to Benin about an hour, to see that there has been a problem but I have been so concern that I have to come out up to this point, and if I could I can even go further, I would actually want to go up to Lagos if possible so that I will actually see what the passengers are going through on a daily basis. It is totally unacceptable, we need to deplore a enough resources here to get this road passable.
"It is true that the only solution we can do right now are temporally ones but they are hard core temporally solution and it will take us up to the dry season at the beginning of November when we will put in place immediately a permanent hard core solution that would carry the road on for the next few years.
"The major problems with our roads is that, while we put in place a very good road at certain time we do not have affected proper routine maintenance particularly on the heavy duty drunk roads such as this one that carry majority transporters and wayfarers across the country. I am very, very unhappy today with what I have seen, I am very displeased but there is no point looking behind us. We really have to just look forward at this point so I will like to apologize to this country as a whole for the deplorable state I have found this road in today and to assure them that my being is the concern that I and this government have for the good welfare of the people of this country particularly as it tranvers from North to South and from East to West, we are doing all within our power to put much of our critical resources into getting this and similar roads back into walkable state in the middle of the rainy season we will look at our salves from much more permanent solution but as you all know we walk within a restricted budget and restricted resources" she added.
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