Member representing Anaocha/Dunukofia/Njikoka Federal Constituency of Anambra State, Valentine Ayika, has called on the Anambra and Enugu governments to undertake palliative repairs on some portions of the Enugu-Onitsha Expressway.
Ayika made the call in an interview with newsmen in Awka on Monday.
He said the rainy season was having a grave destructive effect on parts of the road which had made it a nightmare for motorists using it.
Ayika said he had to order trucks of stones from his personal resources and supervise the filling of deep craters at the Amansea-Oji stretch of the road after he saw the hardship motorists plying the road went through.
“As I was returning from Abuja, I got near Anambra-Enugu boundary and saw how bad the road is now. As a matter of fact, I saw a full-grown family man crying profusely and decided to find out why.
“He told me that he was the driver of a fallen vehicle with all its content spilled. He said he was neither the owner of the truck nor the goods, that he would be the one to pay for goods which fell while he was trying to pass the spot. That was why I decided to order five trucks of stone which was poured there to reduce the depth of the gully on the road,” he said.
Ayika said though the road was a federal one, states, where it passed through, should intervene with short-term repairs so that their citizens using it would not continue to suffer.
The lawmaker said he had secured the support of the speakers of Anambra and Enugu Houses of Assembly who promised to collaborate with him for further palliative works.
He thanked the Federal Government for the work it was doing on the roads and called for more speed.
“The Southeast is erosion-prone and our roads are terribly bad, rain is doing serious damage to them and that is why I am calling on the Federal Government to declare state of emergency on Southeast roads,” he said.
“The roads in question are federal roads but people in the states are those using them, so our state governments should come in as a matter of urgency and so palliative work because people are suffering. I am a normal citizen but more importantly, I represent people of a constituency most of who use that portion of the road that I worked on even if it is in the Enugu side,” he added.
