Reduction Of Budgetary Allocation For Lagos-Ibadan Expressway Appalling -Afenifere
The Pan- Yoruba social political group, Afenifere Renewal Group (ARG), on Sunday described the action of National Assembly in reducing the budgetary allocation for the reconstruction of Lagos-Ibadan Expressway as appalling.
The Afenifere Renewal Group in a statement signed by its Publicity Secretary Kunle Famoriyo said National Assembly’s reduction of the budgetary allocation for the reconstruction of Lagos-Ibadan Expressway showed their myopic understanding of the importance of the Expressway.
Afenifere said, “In NASS’s explanation – claiming that the fund removed from the expressway were moved to other projects to equalise ‘development’ across the country – left us aghast at the shallow thoughts put into decision making in Nigeria.
“This thinking, which assumes illogically that only the Southwest people use the expressway, is the reason the Federal Government has failed to complete the entire stretch of any interstate road since 1999.”
The group pointed out that the importance of the expressway to the nation’s economy and North-South linkage cannot be overstated, saying,” it is reputed to be the busiest inter-state route in West Africa and carrying in excess of 250,000PCEs daily. The rapid industrial, residential and tourism expansion along the road is second only to Lekki-Epe corridor, which is reputed to be the fastest growing real estate corridor in Africa.
“Any wise government will prioritise that road and make it a world-class signature project with attenuating infrastructures to improve its usability. But sadly, a road with such huge potentials, which should translate into economic prosperity for the citizens, has been turned into political mathematics.”
Afenifere added that annually, there are, at least, 300 crashes and incidents along the 127km road leading to the death of at least 100 people, alongside hundreds of cases of incapacitation and inestimable loss of revenue and man-hour.
“The traffic situation along the road also feeds armed robbery, health deterioration and other social malice, particularly by herdsmen.
“Basic application of economics dictates that if we want to maximize satisfaction from scarce resources, then we must prioritize through Scale of Preference. For NASS to think it must spread available resources across all projects finds no supportive argument in Good Governance.
“Similar neglect is happening with the poor condition of Apapa roads, which in addition to the Lagos-Ibadan expressway, constitute the most economically important roads in Nigeria. Ill-informed decisions such as this, where the goose laying the golden egg is physically abused, cannot but motivate people to question the country’s sovereignty and even rise up against it.
“Our interpretation of this vacuous act is that the National Assembly wants a showdown with the Yoruba people of Southwest and they should be ready for this, if they would not restore the allocation. Otherwise the federal government should handover the road to the southwest states as was requested during the Jonathan presidency,” the group said.
