By Oluwatosin Maliki
The Federal Government has given the Ogun State Government the go ahead to fix and toll the dilapidated Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway.
This was disclosed by the Minister of Works, David Umahi, on Monday during a briefing after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting at the Aso Villa.
The Lagos-Abeokuta expressway has been in a deplorable condition for years, people mostly affected are motorists and travellers who have lamented bitterly over the poor condition of the Lagos-Abeokuta expressway, while calling on the government to fix it.
The minister of works, after the Monday’s FEC meeting, explained that the project would be executed under the Highway Development and Management Initiative (HDMI), also adding that the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) and the Federal Ministry of Finance would be involved in the process.
David Umahi stated, “On permission to build federal roads, when such requests are made, we give approval within 24 hours but then there are conditions to be met, they must have to use the Federal Ministry of Works standard designs”.
Furthermore, he said, “Under HDMI, when they (state governments) finish the roads, they have to toll it. There is a maximum number of years they have to toll it, recoup their money and then the funds will have to start coming into Federation Account and that is why we are very much interested in how much the road is going to cost and to adopt the standard procedure in road construction and design. This is very important”.
“An example of this system (HDMI), was the approval of Lagos-Otta-Abeokuta today (Monday) for Ogun State Government to build and toll.”