Nigeria: On the Trail of a Lawmaker's Constituency Efforts

16 March 2014
opinion

My heart lights up each time I recall the events of that bright Tuesday, November 26, 2012 afternoon at Ugwu Tank, Okpome, Agbada, Nenwe in Enugu State. It was the day Ekweremadu flagged off the construction of the N12 Billion Nenwe-Odume-Uburu federal road project. The ecstasy of the jubilant mammoth crowd demonstrated that something out of the ordinary; something they had given up hope on, was happening in their lives.

Oduma in Enugu and Uburu in Ebonyi State were two great agrarian communities, which seemed to have been cut off from civilization owing to the menace of impassable roads. Before, the advent of colonialism, these towns were renowned as home to men of valour and long distance traders. In fact, historical trade routes passed through these towns to Bende and Arochukwu in Abia State, Itu in present day Akwa Ibom State, and thence to Calabar, Cross River State. However, the Oduma and Uburu towns have since had the misfortune isolation from the centres of development. As such, successive governments, both Federal and State had hitherto overlooked the construction of this vital road that would traverse Nenwe in order to link the two towns up with the Enugu Port Harcourt Expressway and thence to the outside world. Owing to the overriding importance of roads in rural development, both towns suffered severe economic misfortunes. Apart from their agrarian capacity, these towns are endowed with minerals and natural resources. For instance, there is limestone and kaolin deposits in Oduma and salt deposits in Uburu. In fact, Ebonyi State earned the sobriquet -"Salt of the nation" on account of the Uburu salt lakes (Umahi), which also have great tourist potentials.

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