524 road projects are currently ongoing in the six geopolitical zones of the country, according to the Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola.
He disclosed this while addressing the House of Representatives Committee on Works headed by Hon. Ahmed Birchi.
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Fashola said there were four multilateral-funded road projects, 81 under the Presidential Infrastructural Development Fund and 45 others being funded under the Sukuk bond.
However, he noted that the ministry was interested in constructing roads that will open up the economy and make business easier for everyone. He said Nigeria would get back on its feet if the government tarred the roads that connected ports to border cities.
“What remains is to finish; the real challenge for us and our recommendation is to adopt the policy statement of the president and focus on whatever resources we have towards completing as many of those projects as possible,” he said.
He added that a funding gap of ₦255 billion was required to “ideally” fund some of the major roads and stressed that the ₦157 billion proposed in the 2020 budget allocation was inadequate.
Fashola said that ₦2.93 billion was pending in unpaid certificates under the multilateral funded projects while ₦306 billion was the amount for unpaid certificates for completed road projects.
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What you should know: In a recent article by Nairametrics, a total of N311.8 billion was approved by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) for the construction and rehabilitation of two link roads connecting the Second Niger Bridge in the South East and other projects being executed at the University of Abuja.
The roads meant to be covered were the Ibadan-Ilesa-Ife road, the Second Niger Bridge to Asaba and Onitsha and phase II of the Kano-Katsina highway. An additional N1.833 billion was approved by the FEC under the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) for programs in the Ministry of Education.
