The Nigerian Senate has urged the Federal Ministry of Finance to, as a matter of urgency, release adequate funds to the Federal Road Maintenance Agency (FERMA) for the purpose of carrying out emergency repairs on all federal roads in the country.
The upper chamber made this call after the planned strike by the National Union of Petroleum and Gas Workers (NUPENG) over the state of highways which continues to cause accidents and claim lives of tanker drivers nationwide, among others.
The planned strike could have resulted in petroleum products scarcity as tanker drivers (PTD) who are under NUPENG had been fully mobilised to withdraw their services – product lifting from depots and supply to filling stations.
The Senate also called on the federal government to immediately declare a state of emergency on federal roads and improve its funding.
These were part of resolutions reached by the chamber following a motion considered during the plenary on Tuesday. Sponsored by Senator Gershom Bassey, it is titled: “Motion on Nigeria’s Bad Roads And NUPENG’S Impending Nationwide Strike”.
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The lawmaker decried the “deplorable state of the federal roads in Nigeria have become a national shame and an unnecessary embarrassment as scores of innocent people are kidnapped by bandits, robbed, mutilated and killed daily in avoidable accidents on account of bad federal roads.”
Bassey disclosed that the federal highways in Nigeria require the sum of about N215 billion per annum to revamp 3,500km of federal roads for 8-10 years for total rehabilitation to be achieved.
He lamented further that from 2016-2020, the actual funds released to FERMA by the federal government for road rehabilitation and maintenance was just about 17 percent of the required sum.
The lawmaker recalled that in 2019, he made a similar call through a motion for increased funding for maintenance and rehabilitation of the country’s federal highways.
He expressed worry that despite several calls, there has not been improved funding for maintenance and rehabilitation of highways. Bassey noted that the 36,000 km federal road network is the largest and most valuable single public infrastructure asset owned by the government of Nigeria.
He added that poor funding and neglect of the roads have led to the abysmal state of federal roads in the country.
Accordingly, the Senate in its resolutions urged the Federal Ministry of Finance to immediately as a matter of urgent national importance release adequate funding to the Federal Road Maintenance Agency to urgently carry out emergency repairs on all federal roads across the country.
The chamber also urged the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing to immediately introduce weight bridges on relevant portions of all Federal highways to check the overloading of trucks and tankers beyond the engineers lead-bearing capacity of such roads.
