The Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Works and Housing, Babangida Hussaini, has disclosed that pockets of issues on compensation and relocation are hindering the completion of the Eastern Bypass in Kaduna State.
He, however, assured that the ministry is working towards addressing the problem.
Speaking to newsmen after his tour of the Abuja-Kaduna Highway to supervise the ongoing work, Hussaini, however, assured that the ministry is working towards completing the Abuja-Kaduna Highway before the 2025 completion deadline.
“The contract for Kaduna eastern bypass was awarded since 2012 and it has suffered a lot of technical challenges ranging from issues of compensation, issues of right of way and issues of community dislocations; so from 2015 to date, if you look at the progress you will discover that a lot of progress has been made.
“Right now, we are almost done with the road works; we are constructing the bridges across the Kaduna River. It is an engineering job, the piling work has been completed and we are working on the buckeye.”
He noted that at the rate the work is going, the road should be completed “But we still have pockets of issues on compensation and relocation, which are the major issues that are slowing down work but we are working on addressing those issues.”
On the 2025 completion deadline for the Abuja-Kaduna highway, he said, “We are not even talking about the deadline because section 1, which is the Kaduna-Zaria highway is coming up good, section 2 and 3 will be done by the end of next year so hopefully, at the rate we are going, we should be making more time even before 2025.”
On his assessment of the work, he said “What you see on paper is not as strong in terms of your own assessment as what you see on ground but I have seen progress. I have seen some channels have been opened and I have also seen some areas that we need to improve on; of which is vegetation control. If you notice along the corridor, there are shrubs and bushes along the way, which I think is not safe, especially, during this season where people engage in bush burning activities.”
He added: “The Abuja-Kaduna highway is about 30-years-old and obviously with the condition of the road, the volume of traffic on the road and the amount of cargo that ply the road, obviously, it is badly degraded and of course, part of our augmentation contract was to address the issue of palliative works as the new road is coming up.
“After the rainy season, we agreed to patch the very bad areas on the road, especially because these are areas prone to criminal activities and this is why we are making efforts and we have already given the engineers orders to the contractors to begin palliative works to address the challenges.”
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