Abuja — President of the Senate, Senator David Mark and the former Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, Chief Emeka Anyaoku's have expressed dissatisfaction on the lingering poor condition of most roads in the country.

This is coming on the heels of the statement by the Corp Marshal of Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) , Mr. Osita Chidoka, that Nigeria presently occupies an unenviable 91st position in the order of the world's safest road with 161 deaths per 10,000 vehicles.

Anyaoku while lamenting the ugly state of our highways, remarked that not even Afghanistan or Iraq presently prosecuting war has such terrible roads as is the situation in the country.

The concern of the two statesmen came just as the Committee of the Senate in-charge of works demanded some explanations from the Minister of Works, Housing and Urban Development on the level of efforts being made by the Ministry to implement the budgetary provisions as they affect road projects in the country.

The Senate President who was represented by the Senate Committee Chairman on Works, Senator Julius Ucha, at the inaugural annual lectures series organised by the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) in Abuja, said the Senate was not happy at the pace of execution of road contracts as provided for in this year's budget.

"We are greatly worried that our roads have continued to be in a dilapidated state, even with all the budgetary provisions for roads. We have approved budgets upon budgets, yet these roads have remained the same, un-repaired", he said.

He said the National Assembly had tried to partner with the executive arm of government to pick out 25 major roads from the 6 geo-political zones of the country that needed special attention but that it is regrettable that the projects have remained at the contract awarding stage with nothing being done to get them off the ground.

In the same vein, Anyaoku who bared his mind while delivering a

lecture on causes of accidents on our roads described the country's roads as "a huge slaughter slab, where human lives appear to worth little or nothing".