As a result of the deplorable state of Sango-Ota Road, commuters have blamed the former President, Olusegun Obasanjo, and former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole,
over the poor state of the road.
Some of the commuters who spoke in an interview with our correspondent lamented the failure of the two public officers to fix the road though Obasanjo had eight years as President of the country and Bankole about four years as a Speaker to do so.
One of the commuters, Mr. Ayo Adefemi, who described the state of the road as saddening said, “This is a major road that links Ogun State to Lagos. It is very saddening that prominent sons of Ogun State had been in the forefront of affairs in this country for about 12 years and they did nothing concrete to rehabilitate this road.This is indeed a sad development.”
He decried the lost opportunities of rehabilitating the road just as he expressed doubt about any immediate concrete attention on the road by the Federal Government.
A commercial driver, Mr. Segun Oni, described the road as a nightmare to motorists.
He also blamed the former leaders for the deplorable state of the road but appealed to the Federal Government to pay urgent attention to the road.
“The state of the road now is such that we don’t have a choice but to appeal to the Federal Government to come to the aid of the people in ensuring that this major road is fixed,” he stated.
Efforts made by our correspondent to get Obasanjo’s reactions on the commuters indictment failed, but Bankole who spoke through his former personal assistant on media, Mr Kayode Odunaro, said he made some efforts to address the problem of the road.
Bankole said, “It was through my effort as the Speaker then that the Ota Bridge — a major link to the road — was completed. Initially the project was abandoned because there was no budgetary provision but as the Speaker then, we made sure that appropriation was made for the project which was over N3billion and that was how the bridge was completed.”
As for the delay in the rehabilitation of the road, Bankole blamed it on disagreement on contract variations between the company handling the road project and the Federal Ministry of Works.
“I was aware that the company handling the project was seeking for variations for the road aspects of the project from the Federal Ministry of Works and that was the stage we were till we left office,” he stated.
Bankole stated that the new representatives of the people of the state both in Senate and the House of Representatives should put pressure on the Ministry of Works to conclude the negotiations on variations so that the project could be completed as soon as possible.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment