Vanguard
14 October 2008
editorial
Governor Peter Obi's cry to the Senate Committee on Works about the importance of the second Niger Bridge pales beside the imminent collapse of the existing bridge, which is a patch up of the 43-year-old bridge blown up during the civil war after Biafran troops marched on Ore.
Last July, Dr. Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, a permanent secretary in the Office of Secretary to the Government of the Federation, and a former permanent secretary in the Ministry of Works, told the same Senate Committee on Works that the Niger Bridge could collapse soon.
"I must say this since we are in a public hearing that the Niger Bridge is collapsing. The Federal Government cannot do it, and in fact should not do it. The private sector should now be involved," Dr. Baba-Ahmed told the senators.
Dr. Baba-Ahmed's suggestion that the Federal Government should not repair bridge is prejudiced. On what basis did he make this recommendation to the Senate? If he considered the bridge an emergency, why would he opt for measures that, would delay its repair or the construction of a new bridge?
When it comes to the Niger Bridge Federal Government wavers. Has the untested public private partnership built any bridge in Nigeria ? Why make the Niger Bridge a guinea pig?
The Niger Bridge got to this state from similar duplicities. When the Third Mainland Bridge in Lagos was rated unsafe, did it take decades for the Federal Government to repair it?
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo made an election promise of a second Niger Bridge in 2003. President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua repeated the promise in his campaign last year, when estimate for a new Niger Bridge was N58 billion. The entire budget for federal roads in 2008 is a laughable N79 billion!
President Yar'Adua said nothing about the Niger Bridge in 17 months of his administration. His 2008 budgets ignored the bridge, a convenient excuse for no work on the Niger Bridge.
The collapse of the bridge would cut off the South East and most of the South South from the rest of Nigeria. They would have to depend on unimaginable detours through undeveloped routes to access Nigeria. Economic bases of Onitsha, Aba, and Nnewi would be shut out.
Minister of Transportation, Mrs Diezani Alison-Madueke on the Niger Bridge: "We have been trying very hard in the last two months to iron out the various details of the agreement on the contract for the second Niger Bridge. These details will be finalised within the next couple of weeks. The bridge is a critical bridge and we have been extremely concerned in the Federal Ministry of Transportation & Works about the integrity of both the old Niger Bridge , and the actual construction of the second bridge. Within the next two weeks, the Federal Government will make some pronouncements on the second Niger Bridge."
Government should reach a fast and firm decision on the Niger Bridge - the repairs and a new bridge - instead of an enquiry when the bridge collapses.
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