The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Lagos-Ibadan

  • Julius Berger returns to Lagos-Ibadan Expressway this month

    Construction work would resume this month on the Section 1 of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. The Federal Government has mobilised the contractor, Julius Berger Plc, to return to site, it was learnt yesterday.

    The Federal Controller of Works in Lagos, Mr Godwin Eke, confirmed the development after inspecting road projects in Lagos.

    Eke said that the project was over 50 per cent completed before the contractors left site due to debts owed it.

    Section 1 of the project awarded Julius Berger spans from the old toll gate plaza at Ojota end of the highway in Lagos State to the Sagamu Interchange in Ogun.

    Messrs Reynolds Construction Company (RCC) was hired by the Federal Government to reconstruct Section 2 which spans from the Sagamu Interchange to Ibadan in Oyo State.

    Eke said: “Recently, we got approval for the augmentation because at a point, Julius Berger could not make claims for works already executed.

    “So, now that we have the approval in our hands, construction work will soon resume fully on Section 1 of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. The project is more than 50 per cent completed.”

    According to him, the President Muhammad Buhari-led administration had been able to clear the debt owed by previous administrations on road projects.

    Eke said that this would pave the way for the completion of the various ongoing road projects.

    The controller also said that construction work had resumed on the two pedestrian bridges on the Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway.

  • Amaechi: Lagos-Ibadan rail line to be ready this year

    Amaechi: Lagos-Ibadan rail line to be ready this year

    Minister of Transportation Rotimi Amaechi has said the Lagos-Ibadan rail project will be completed this year.

    Amaechi said about $40 billion would be required to complete rail and sea port projects this year.

    The minister, who disclosed this at the inauguration of additional locomotives and coaches at the Rigasa Station, Kaduna State, restated Federal Government commitment to implementing the project.

    Speaking at the event, President Muhammadu Buhari also restated his commitment to link all commercial and production centres in the country via rail to develop the economy and promote national integration.

    Amaechi said: “We have huge challenges we have to face but one assurance we will give Nigerians is that we will do everything possible to ensure we complete Lagos-Ibadan this year.

    “We are negotiating with contractors and funders who will fund the project. If we are able to conclude the arrangements, taking into consideration Nigeria’s law, then, we will start both this year. That include Port Harcourt to Maiduguri, Kano to Jibia, Abuja to Baru, the sea port in Bonny, sea port in Warri and so many other projects.

    “That’s why I said we will need between $36 and $40 billion. Only God knows where we are going to get it from.”

    The minister lauded Buhari for his commitment to developing the sector and further pleaded for supports from the Finance Ministry.

    The President said the new rail system would support and ease transportation in the country.

    He restated his commitment to reviving the rail sector.

    He called for stakeholders support especially from the National Assembly and lauded the transport minister for his hardwork on projects.

  • Five die in Lagos-Ibadan road crash

    Five die in Lagos-Ibadan road crash

    • 13 others injured

    Five persons, including a baby, have died in a road crash at the Ogere (Ogun State) stretch of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.

    Thirteen others were injured.

    The accident, which occurred early yesterday, involved a Mazda bus, registered as DDA 121 XA and a truck, marked: MGD 129 ZF.

    It was learnt that the driver of the bus lost control, veered off his lane and crashed into a packed trailer by the roadside.

    Five of the passengers were said to have died on the scene.

    The Sector Commander of Ogun State Command of Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) Clement Oladele said the bus carried 18 passengers and was travelling from Ibadan to Lagos.

    Oladele said three men, one woman and a male child died in the accident while six men , two women and five male children were injured.

    The FRSC chief blamed the accident on dangerous driving and failure to follow road safety rules by the bus driver.

    He said: “Failure to follow road safety rules caused the accident. Immediately the incident happened, the driver of the commercial bus ran away.

    “A man-hunt has been launched to arrest the driver and charge him for dangerous driving leading to the death of some of his passengers.

    “The injured have been taken to the Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital (OOUTH) at Sagamu and Vitory Hospital at Ogere for treatment. The remains of the dead passengers have been deposited at a morgue at Ipara in Ogun State.”

  • Senator assures on Lagos-Ibadan road completion

    •N20.5b in 2018 budget for dual carriageway

    The ongoing Lagos-Ibadan express road repairs will soon be completed, the senator representing Lagos West, Solomon Adeola, has said.

    Adeola assured the residents that work on the dual carriageway, being undertaken by Julius Berger Nigeria Plc and Reynolds Construction Company Limited, will be completed, hopefully, in 2018.

    The assurance is coming on the heel of controversy trailing alleged reduced funding for the busy road in the 2018 budget.

    The Lagos West lawmaker noted that ample provisions (N20.5 billion) were made for the road in the 2018 budget proposal.

    A statement by his media aide, Kayode Odunaro, said the senator, who is the Chairman of Senate Committee on Local Content and a member of the Senate Finance Committee, was reacting to the recent condemnations of the Executive and the National Assembly over the reduction of a proposed N31 billion to N10 billion in the 2017 budget and the failure of a proposed virement before the presentation of the 2018 budget proposals.

    Adeola was quoted to have said that with the President’s presentation of the 2018 budget, “the issue of virement is now in abeyance with the issue still trapped in legislative process of the National Assembly”.

    He added: “Following the President’s presentation of the 2018 budget proposal, our focus is now on how to appropriate funds for the Lagos-Ibadan express dual carriageway as the virement requested by the Executive as well as supplementary budget suggested by some of us did not see the light of day with the year almost gone.”

    The senator expressed happiness that the 2018 budget proposal under consideration made ample provisions for the expressway, which serves as a major road network for economic activities in Nigeria.

    He added that efforts would be made to ensure that the provisions are passed and strict implementation enforced for the completion of the project.

    Aseola said: “In all, N20.5 billion was made for the dual carriageway in the 2018 proposal. For Section 1 of the project, N9 billion was proposed while Section 2 of the project has N11.5 billion. We will consider an increase, if possible, in view of debt from unpaid completion certificates already executed on the two sections to see contractors back to site and working fully early next year.”

  • House queries funding of Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Second Niger Bridge

    House queries funding of Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Second Niger Bridge

    The House of Representatives is worried about the stalling of work on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway project.

    After a debate, the lawmakers demanded a full explanation from the Executive on how the project will be funded.

    The lawmakers also expressed misgiving about the pace of work and funding of the Second Niger Bridge linking the West to the East.

    They wanted to know whether the projects are to be fully-funded by the Federal Government or to be executed under a concession agreement with private firms.

    The House Committee on Works was mandated to investigate the nature of the contracts and concession arrangement and report back in four weeks for further parliamentary action.

    But the discussion did not make reference to the pending virement request by the Executive on the 2017 budget.

    The virement is meant to take back the money removed from the Lagos –Ibadan project to service constituency projects by the lawmakers.

    The resolution of the House followed the passage of a motion by Solomon Maren with the title: “Need to investigate nature of the contract or concession arrangement on Second Niger Bridge and Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.”

    Moving the motion, Maren said the projects had not followed the established pattern of project execution and that the Minister of Power, Works and Housing Babatunde Fashola, recently warned on the possibility of both projects ending up as “white elephant” .

    Allocation for the projects in the 2017 budget were not adequate and they are not under concession agreement.

    He said: “Contracts for the construction of the Second Niger Bridge and reconstruction of the Lagos-Ibadan Express Road have continued to feature in the annual budgets without any seeming signal of their completion or the amount required to do so.”

    Maren, in response to a remark by the Deputy Speaker, Yussuff Lasun said though two contractors were handling the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, the Federal Government is yet to make up its mind on the funding arrangement for the two projects.

    Lasun, against the tradition of not debating infrastructure motions, gave the floor to the Chairman,  Committee on Works, Tobey Okechukwu, to speak on the issue.

    Okechuwku, who supported the motion, said it had become imperative for government to come up with a framework for the completion of the projects, adding that this stemmed from the observation of his committee that while the Lagos-Ibadan Road is “supposed to have alternative funding”,  the Federal Government had not made a clear-cut decision on the funding plan for the Second Niger Bridge.

    The lawmaker said the “piece-meal procurement” funding method hitherto employed by the government should be dropped.

    Mohammed Sani-Abdul, who also supported the motion, said despite litigation on the Lagos-Ibadan Road, work was still ongoing.

    He said the situation of the Second Niger-Bridge project is of great concern.

    The non-utilisation of the N14 billion 2016 budget allocation and the N10 billion allocated in 2017 for the Second Niger Bridge was worrisome based on the fact that the concession agreement for the project was between Federal Government and an international investment company, which later sub-contracted the project to Julius Berger Plc.

    With no contract between the Federal Government and Julius Berger, the construction firm cannot be directly funded through budgetary allocations for the project, Sani-Abdul’s said.

  • 2018 Budget: LCCI lauds 30.8% capital allocation

    2018 Budget: LCCI lauds 30.8% capital allocation

    The Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) has commended the Federal Government for allocating 30.8 per cent of the 2018 Federal Budget to capital projects.

    The Director-General of LCCI, Mr Muda Yusuf, gave the commendation in a statement on Thursday in Lagos.

    President Muhammadu Buhari presented the N8.6 trillion 2018 Federal Budget to the National Assembly on Nov. 7.

    The N8.6 trillion 2018 Budget represents a 16 per cent increase in nominal term over the 2017 Budget of N7.44 trillion.

    “We welcome the priority accorded to infrastructure in the budget proposal focusing on roads, railways, power projects, water projects and second Niger bridge.

    “Reference was made to the embarrassing state of the access to the ports and the public private initiative to fix it.

    “We welcome the decision to connect the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge to the Apapa and the Tin-Can Island port.

    “But time is of the essence.

    “There is an urgent need to save the private sector and investors from the agony of persistent gridlock at the Apapa and Tin-Can ports which accounts for over 70 per cent of import and export cargo in the country,” he said.

    Yusuf said that it was imperative to formulate policies to mobilise private sector capital into the infrastructure space.

    He said that consideration should be given to further reduction in cost of governance and scaling up remittances of surplus from MDAs to the coffers of government.

    The LCCI boss also said there was the need to refocus government’s tax drive from direct to indirect taxes in line with the National Tax Policy.

    “A disproportionate focus on direct taxation is detrimental to investment and hard work.

    “There is also need to curb the growing incidence of multiplicity of taxes and levies on businesses at all levels of government,” he said.

    According to him, as the budget appropriation process progresses, there is need for clarifications on the status of budgetary appropriation for petroleum subsidy both for the current fiscal year and 2018.

    “It is also necessary to throw some light on the status of the estimated N800 billion debt to oil marketers.

    “Investors in this sector would like to see a sustainable framework for the management of petrol subsidy,” Yusuf said.

    He also called for clarification on the status of Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) debts estimated at about N5 trillion within the debt management framework of the government.

    Yusuf said that clarification on the framework for payment of contractors’ arrears which cuts across various MDAs should be provided.

    “The non-payment of contractor’s arrears has taken a huge toll on many contractors.

    “The amount involved has been estimated at over N1 trillion,” he said.

    The LCCI boss appealed to the National Assembly to ensure speedy consideration of the appropriation bill toward normalising the budgetary cycle and bringing greater predictability to the economic management process.

    NAN

  • Two Lagos bridges to make way for standard gauge

    •Costain, Jibowu to be affected, says minister 

    THE Costain and Jibowu bridges on Lagos Mainland will soon be demolished to pave way for the construction of the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge rail line, the Minister of Transportation, Mr Rotimi Amaech, has said.

    Amaechi spoke yesterday at Papalanto in Ewekoro Local Government Area of Ogun State, ending speculations on the fate of the Lagos bridges.

    The Chinese contractor, the China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC), had identified the bridges as being too low for the head room projected for the proposed speed train.

    The minister said the Ijoko Bridge in Ogun State would not be demolished, adding that stakeholders agreed that the rail tracks should go down by a few metres to give them the right height under the bridge.

    Speaking after a tour of the project with other members of the steering committee, Amaechi said it was decided that though the two bridges would be demolished, they would be rebuilt immediately to avoid disruption of the state’s pattern of mobility.

    Amaechi said the two bridges carry a huge cargo and passenger traffic.

    On the project, Amaechi disclosed that CCECC will begin to lay the tracks from Lagos in December, while that of Papanlanto to Ibadan will start by next May.

    Amaechi, who restated Federal Government’s commitment to the December 2018 deadline for the project, said the areas that pose the greatest challenges are Lagos, Abeokuta and Ibadan, especially the cities’ built-up areas.

    According to him, major infrastructure, such as bridges, electric cables, water and gas pipelines, houses and telecommunications cables, would be relocated to give the project a smooth sail.

    He expressed the confidence that despite the challenges, the Presidential Order to deliver the project remained on course.

    Amaechi said he was confident that CCECC’s work flow was in tandem with the work plan designed by the Ministry of Transportation and its stakeholders.

    He added: “I have seen that the contractor has put three different gangs in place: the first at Ebute Metta, the second at Ijoko and the third at Papalanto, all of which are working simultaneously. If this pace is maintained, we have no doubt that we will be able to deliver this project to Nigerians on schedule.”

    The minister urged the Project Coordinator, Mr Leo Yin, to complete the necessary documentation to enable the government provide tight security on the project site.

    He visited Ijoko, Itori and Papalanto community in Ogun State as part of the monthly site monitoring of the project.

    Yin expressed the confidence that the project would be delivered by December 2018.

     

  • Corpses along Lagos-Ibadan expressway

    SIR: I want to bring to the attention of the authorities the rampant sightings of corpses along Lagos-Ibadan expressway, in particular around the Kara Bridge. The bodies do not appear to be accident victims, and are not picked up but left for extended periods to decompose in full glare of all passers-by.

    Sometime in June, the body of a man was left on the bridge in a sitting position, and remained there in the sun and rain for up to a week before it was removed. I am calling on the security and emergency response authorities of Lagos and Ogun State (and other relevant authorities) to bring an end to this unsightly situation. Let there be security personnel patrolling the bridge to deter all murderous activities, and emergency response for prompt retrieval of the bodies of these Nigerians, so they do not suffer indignity even in death.

     

    • Omolara Adebisi,

    Magboro, Ogun State.

  • IGP orders dismantling of roadblocks on Lagos-Ibadan, Shagamu-Benin, others

    IGP orders dismantling of roadblocks on Lagos-Ibadan, Shagamu-Benin, others

    The Inspector General of Police, IGP Ibrahim Idris has ordered the immediate dismantling of all roadblocks nationwide. Some of the routes where the order d is expected to take effect include; Lagos-Ibadan, Shagamu-Benin, Benin-Onitsha, Okene-Abuja, Kaduna-Kano, Katsina – Kano, Otukpo – Enugu, Enugu – Port Harcourt Express Ways and others. The police in a statement in Abuja yesterday by the Force Spokesman, CSP Jimoh Moshood explained that the dismantling would enable ease of doing business in Nigeria, adding that it would safeguard, and guarantee free passage of goods and travelers throughout the country. The IG also said no Police department, section, squad or unit should mount road block without express permission from him. The statement read: “Consequently, Assistant Inspectors General of Police in charge of Zonal Commands, Commissioners of Police in charge of State Commands, Heads of Departments, must ensure that every patrol vehicle in their respective Formation carries a conspicuous and legible inscription of Patrol vehicle identification number, and dedicated emergency Phone numbers for ease of identification and report of distress by members of the public. “The Assistant Inspector General of Police in charge of Border patrol of the Force is specifically directed to ensure compliance with this directive along the Border routes in the country except the few approved points by the Federal Government. “Furthermore, Police personnel who involve in vehicular Patrol on highways and major roads across the country must wear on their uniforms a bold name tag and service number” The Statement also said the Special X-Squad teams of the Force have been deployed throughout the country and they are under strict instructions to arrest, investigate and discipline any Police personnel flouting the order. “The IGP has also directed the Special X-Squads to embark on removal of other forms of illegal blockage and obstructions on Highways and Roads, created by unlawful Revenue/Tax collectors, Road Transport Unions, Labour and Trade related unions inhibiting vehicular movement and smooth passage of passengers and goods, and other road users across the country. “For avoidance of doubt, the Taxes and Levies act, Laws of Federation of Nigeria 2004 section 2 (2) disallowed any person, including a Tax Authority from mounting a Road block in any part of the Federation for the purposes of collecting any Tax or Levy”.

  • Lagos-Ibadan rail ready next year

    Lagos-Ibadan rail ready next year

    THE Federal Government is committed to providing standard gauge rail service to Lagosians by the fourth quarter of 2018, Minister of Transportation Rotimi Amaechi has said.

    He spoke after assessing the project at Ijoko, in Ado Odo/Ota Local Government area of Ogun State.

    “We have said 2018 and that is a presidential directive. By December 2018, we want to see locomotives running from Lagos to Ibadan. We are committed to achieving this and the fund obtained from China Exim Bank is already on ground to ensure that nothing obstructs this timeline.”

    He said: “Primary constraint the contractor identified are the height of two pedestrian bridges in Lagos (at Oshodi and Ikeja), and an ongoing flyover bridge at Ijoko. The second problem was the multiplicity of level crossing on the rail’s right of way. The contractor said they could not proceed on laying the rail tracks until those impediments are sorted out.”

    Amaechi, who briefed reporters on site with the Ogun Governor Ibikunle Amosun, said as soon as the issues of the flyover height and others associated with the right-of-way are addressed, actual work would begin on the project.

    He said while the project needs a minimum height of 6.5 metres, the identified bridges are about 4.5 metres high.

    The minister added that the height of the bridge would have to be raised higher to accommodate future electrification of the train’s right-of-way.

    Amaechi and Amosun agreed that engineers from the contractor and the Ministry of Work and the Ministry of Transportation should meet on the best way to resolve the logjam.

    The minister said the governor approved the closure of the two roads abutting the bridge to allow unhindered operation around the train’s right-of-way.

    “The engineers are going to meet from today and we will also meet by Wednesday. So, by Friday, I would be meeting with Governor Amosun on the best option identified by the engineers and that’s what we’re going to take,” he said.

    Thanking the Federal Government for coming up finally with the standard gauge project, Amosun said Ogun State is committed to working with the government to resolve all the challenges to achieve the modern train service.