David Umahi, Minister of Works, on Wednesday requested that the National Assembly release approximately N650 million that had been withheld for various projects across the country.
He stated that the projects were virtually finished, but a shortage of funds was keeping the contractors on site.
Umahi stated during a news conference in Abuja that the way Nigeria’s budgetary allocation was designed discouraged contractors from completing road projects. He claimed that releasing funding to contractors on a yearly basis caused road improvements to stall because the contractor had minimal access in most circumstances.
“When you give a contractor N150m a year for N600m road project, he’ll pocket it while mobilising to site without doing anything on ground. When confronted, he’ll say he’s yet to get the material he requested for outside the country as the money was not enough.”
He urged Nigerians to plant cash crops along highways to discourage kidnappings.
“Nigerians must get value for their taxes, road is everything, where we are having kidnapping is on the spot where roads are bad, we should remove the bushes and plant cash crop, it is ideal and acceptable and we should replicate it in all parts of the country. It’ll remove the kidnappings,” he said.
Umahi stated that the construction of a concreate road would not be enforced on projects that had already been awarded. He did, however, say that contractors would need to guarantee that asphalt roads would survive up to 30 years, even though concrete roads would last longer.
“We are not stopping asphalt works but it is not possible to be paying the job that we know will not stand for five years. Contractors hide under funny excuse of overloading for road not standing long.”
He stated that the Federal Road Management Agency’s operations would be scrutinized to “ensure that any intervention in states is done with the input of the state government to know the roads with top priority.”
