Once again, hope is rising for residents, businesses and motorists on Apapa-Oshodi Expressway as another round of talks has begun on how to rehabilitate the dilapidated expressway, which is one of the only two major routes to the two busiest seaports in West Africa.
The minister of power, works and housing, Babatunde Fashola, who disclosed this in Abuja recently, also said the expressway was among the many highways across the country that were captured for repair in the just passed 2017 budget.
Apapa-Oshodi Expressway is a curious metaphor for a failed project. It is a 27.5Km road that was constructed between 1975-1978. It originates from Apapa Port and terminates at Oworonsoki junction. The expressway is a major gateway to Nigeria’s busiest seaports from where the Federal Government rakes billions of naira import and export revenue on regularly basis.
But despite its strategic economic importance, the expressway has remained in a messy situation in the last decade. The last time hope of respite on it was raised was in November 2010 when Julius Berger and Borini Prono won the N6.2 billion contract for its rehabilitation and reconstruction.
Seven years down the line, apart from the half-way job done by Julius Berger, the expressway remains in deep mess with trailers and tankers of various lengths and sizes packed indiscriminately and denying other road users access to the expressway.
The immediate past Minister of Works, Mike Onolememen, had disclosed that due to Federal Government’s limited resources, it was giving priority attention to roads infrastructure projects that had direct impact on the nation’s economy, adding that his ministry inherited a portfolio of about 168 projects requiring about N1 trillion to complete.
“We have targeted all the roads leading to the sea ports, refineries, the major arterial roads and major dual carriageways”, he said, and it was interesting to note that Apapa-Oshodi Expressway was on the list. Similarly, Fashola had explained to a committee of the House of Representatives where he presented the list of roads and highways for rehabilitation that “the intention is to connect states, drive economy, move fuel, food and import and export of goods”.
Because of the deplorable and impassable state of the Apapa-Oshodi Expressway and the unwholesome activities of the truck drivers, many businesses and Apapa residents who can no longer cope with the suffocation of the environment have been forced to relocate at great expense to family income and company bottom line.
In a state that is burdened by housing deficit estimated at three million units, Apapa, which is one of the prime locations in Lagos, is almost a ghost town with many empty homes and abandoned business premises. It is not only that vacancy rate is on daily increase, property values have also declined significantly.
However, though there are concerns over what becomes of the subsisting contract with Julius Berger and Botini Prono, the present move shows some light at the end of the tunnel.
Fashola informed that for the purpose of effective implementation, the identified 63 roads requiring emergency repairs has been classified into critical economic routes and agricultural routes and they include all roads traversing geopolitical zones, advancing trade and commerce across the states and leading to the ports as well as those passing through agricultural areas across the country.
The road projects are spread out in such a way that no zone has been left out and they include Kano-Katsina Road (Phase 1: Kano Town at Dawanau Roundabout to Katsina State Border), Sokoto-Tambuwal-Jega-Yauri Road, Ilorin-Jebba-Mokwa-Bokani Road, Ilorin-Kabba-Obajana Road (Sections 1&11), Ibadan-Ilorin Road, Section 11(Oyo-Ogbomosho), Lagos-Shagamu-Ibadan Dual Carriageway, Sections 1&11 and Lagos-Otta Road.
Others are Apapa/Tincan Port, NNPC Depot (Atlas Cove) to Mile 2 Access Road, Apapa-Oshodi Road, Third Mainland Bridge, Apapa/Tincan Island Port-NNPC Depot Access Road, Benin-Ofosu-Ore Ajebandele-Shagamu Road, Obajana Junction-Benin Road Phase 2 (Sections i-iv), Sapele-Ewu Road Sections 1&11, Second Niger Bridge, Onitsha-Enugu Expressway.
All these roads are in terrible condition due to long years of neglect. “Apapa-Oshodi Expressway is shame of a nation”, says Mayen Adetiba, former president of Association of Consulting Engineers of Nigeria (ACEN), adding, “it is sad that the Federal Government has allowed the road to degenerate to this level where it wears out its users with long hours in traffic and exposes them to attack by miscreants”.
CHUKA UROKO
