Anayo Okoli
10 October 2008
Umuahia — Worried by the condition of federal roads in the state which it described as being in "total mess", Abia State Government said it has awarded contract worth N5.3 billion to reconstruct two major federal roads in Aba, the commercial capital.
The roads are the busy Aba-Owerri road and Port Harcourt road.Presently, the two roads are actually in a state of utter disrepair which has been a great source of worry to the residents and visitors to Aba as several man-hours are wasted on daily basis on these roads in heavy traffics caused by the bad condition of the road.
The two roads, presently single lane roads, are to be dualized, with street lights and bigger drainage system. The construction of the two roads will be stone-bases.
According to Abia state Commissioner for Works and Transport, Prince Paul Ikonne, who announced this in his office while speaking with journalists, Port Harcourt road was awarded at a cost of N2.8 billion, while Aba-Owerri road was awarded at the cost of N2.5 billion. The two roads, he explained must have bigger drainages with stone-base.
"We have told the contractor what we want. The roads must have new and bigger drainages and the construction must be stone-bases", Ikonne warned.
Read comments. Write your own.
Copyright © 2008 Vanguard. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
Bravo!! Good news. Well let's hope that the contract for the recontruction of the federal roads will be honoured to the letter. This announcement couldn't have come at a time when the city of Aba resembles a war zone. Aba people deserve to have good roads and other infrastructures. let us keep our fingers crossed.
Nhmm! Nhmm! When it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it is a duck. This sounds like another gimmick to use a real defined problem to siphon and stash out the people's money.
The problem with this contract is that it lacks time of completion and therefore cannot be a legal contract. We have been told what the contract would accomplish but it did not specified in concrete terms when this project would be completed. This is another way of passing the buck to the next administration but would show on the list of accomplishments by the present administration.
It is a good thing that the Abia state gvt has undertaken to repair these federal roads and debit it to the federal gvt.The repairs are urgently needed. The federal gvt has unfortunately not been forthcoming in handling projects in the Eastern part of the country. But hearing about award and subsequent release of huge sums is one thing, actualy implementing the job is another. On the assumption of office by Theodore Orji after being single handely placed there by former chief crook orji Uzor Kalu, He (T.Orji) awarded the contract for street lights on major roads at aba (to be powered by generators) and huge money disbursed.Till date the street lights are hanging half way and there seems no more plan for their completion (rumore has it that Chief crooks mother stopped that project so that people wount say that T.Orji is doing better than her son did).Aba seems one of the dirtiest town in Nigeria (Inspite of being a major trading town known far and wide). Refuses are visible in the middle of roads.But a governor decides it is street lights that are more important inspite of no power, yet he couldnt complete it, the money has been swallowed.Abia state seems to be the most unfortunate state of the federation.After having the worst 8 years under Nigeria's insultive and disrespectful crook orji uzor kalu, the state is now coursed with another orji being the complete surrogate of the crook.I pray God helps Abia to get people like Donald Duke or even his successor Imoke (who is a national thief but a local hero as he is doing good in his home state after stealing the power sector blind with Obj). Unfortunately there is realy not much Onyema ugochukwu of PDP can offer if he wins the appeal case to unsit T.Orji. However Ugochukwu would be better if for one thing, he will not be under the spell of crook Orji Uzor Kalu and his mother.He will be his own man.So let all Nigerians pray for the courts to take out the state from the firm grip of thief Orji Kalu.