Concrete roads cheaper more durable, says Dangote

Aliko Dangote, chairman of Dangote Cement has reiterated his plea to the Federal Government to urgently consider the use of concrete in the constuction of roads as against asphalt in the country because it is significantly cheaper and much more durable.

Speaking with journalists at the weekend, Africa’s richest man said it would be to the benefit of Nigerians and even the Federal Government to embrace the option of concrete for roads.

He said aside from being very cheap, concrete roads are more durable and that maintenance cost is near zero.

He added, “We are pushing for Nigeria to do a concrete road. It is cheaper to do a concrete road that will last 50 years than to do a bitumen road. It will also help in eliminating corruption because if you go and build a bitumen road, it will have to be adequately maintained unlike a concrete that is very durable.”

It would be recalled that the company has just expanded its frontiers to Asia, by constructing a three million metric tons per annum (mmtpa), Cement Plant in Nepal, as part of its new investment of $4.34 billion into 10 African countries.

The company is also currently in 15 African countries, excluding Kenya, Niger and Mali, which are new projects.  The company’s current total capacity stands at 48mmtpa, out of which Nigeria alone has the largest chunk of 29.3mmtpa.

Dangote recently said: “…..We are not only building cement plants in Africa, we have gone far away to Nepal to build a three million metric tons cement plant capacity and by the time all these our new projects are completed in the next two years, Dangote Cement will have more than 70 million capacity, but we are not going to stop there, hopefully, by 2020, our targets is getting to somewhere around 100 million tons capacity. I can assure you that Africa will not lack cement now and even in the future…Africa will be self -sufficient rather than be a dumping ground for other manufacturers of cement. “

The new Plants for which agreement was signed recently with Sinoma, was on the construction of the following Plants: 3mmtpa in Nepal, 2.5mmtpa in Ethiopia, 3mmtpa in both Kenya 1&2; 1.5mmtpa in Zambia; 1.5mmtpa in Senegal, 1.5mmtpa in Niger, 1.5mmtpa in Mali, Cameroon, Cote D’Ivoire and Ghana  also have Plants of 1.5mmtpa capacity respectively.