Driving through the roads of Warri used to be a herculean task as most of the roads were bad. Some of the bad roads that gave motorists nightmare were the Airport road Junction, Jakpa Junction, Airport road, Osubi/Eku road and others.
It was hell driving through these roads. Motorists used to go through hard time just for them to get to their destinations. Ten minutes drive from Effurun Roundabout to Enerhen Junction took drivers hours because of failed portions of these roads.
A lot of appeals were made to the Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, to come and fix the bad portions of the Airport Junction and other roads but the Governor told Deltans that they will be fixed after the rains, urging motorists and other road users to be patient and that as soon as the rains were over, the bad roads will be fixed.
And while waiting for the rains to go away, motorists continued to suffer on a daily basis on these bad roads. It was a nightmare for motorists and others.
But Governor Uduaghan hurriedly fixed the Warri bad roads for President Goodluck Jonathan, who came to the oil-rich city of Warri on Sunday, November 10, 2013 to attend the Jubilee Word Festival of Word of Life Bible Church.
Most of the roads were still being repaired on that Sunday morning when the President arrived town.
Our reporter went to town to seek the opinion of residents and find out their feelings about the roads hurriedly fixed by the governor.
Mr. David Asuquo, said that he was happy to see that the State Governor was repairing the road, but wondered why he waited this long to do the roads. He said it was the same roads that he said he could not do because of the rains that he is now doing even when the rains are still falling.
Mr. Asuquo said; “I am really happy that the State Governor has finally started repairing these roads. We have been suffering a lot in this road, especially the Airport Junction Roundabout. We used to suffer in this for road for several hours before we could get to our destination. What I do not understand was why he decided to do it now when he could have done it earlier. I cannot question him too much because the most important thing is that he has done the road and traffic is now better.”
To Mr. Benjamin Ejiro, Governor Uduaghan has done what he is supposed to do by fixing the roads. He said the people can now breathe a sigh of relief now that the roads have been repaired, noting that whether the roads were fixed because the President was visiting the city or not does not matter to him.
“I do not care whether the roads were fixed because of President Jonathan. All I know is that the roads have been fixed. Governor Uduaghan may decide not to do the roads even if the President was coming. He is the Governor of the State and governance is not an easy thing to do. To me I am very happy that the roads are fixed because I know what I used to pass through each time I am passing this road.”
It would be recalled that Reformer had written about the poor state of the roads in Warri and its environs where commuter pleaded with the State Governor to come to their aid and help them patch the bad roads.
