By Francis Sadhere
The Federal Government has been charged to declare a state of emergency on the roads in the South-South and South East to give the people in the geopolitical zones a sense of belonging.
The Center for Peace and Environmental Justice (CEPEJ) which gives the charge, decries the deplorable natures of the roads in the geopolitical zones
The Center adds that most federal roads in the two zones were now death traps, urging the federal government to immediately award contracts for the reconstruction of the various roads.
‘’We believe that the people of the South-South and South East deserve better treatments than what they are getting from the central government.’’
It blames previous administrations of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan for paying lip-service to the development of critical infrastructures.
‘’Government should not continue to play politics with development. We call on the federal government to step up efforts at developing critical infrastructures with a view to giving a sense of belonging to the people. ‘’
The Center urges the government to do the needful by ensuring that the roads contracts are awarded to competent contractors and not cronies or proxy companies.
Besides, It advises the government to urgently constitute a panel to investigate the abandoned and poorly executed federal road contracts within the two zones, because all the federal roads in the areas have totally collapsed and now impassable.
The statement reads: “It is even more depressing that some members of the National Assembly from the affected geopolitical zones had in recent past occupied key positions as Chairmen Senate and House of Representatives Committees for Works and Federal Road Maintenance Agency, FERMA yet the federal highways which oversight they supervised are today impassable and deathtraps.
‘’It is equally worrisome to note that contracts for some of these roads had been awarded to various contractors and huge funds released to them without any appreciable job done on them. And where some jobs were done, they were poor and could not last beyond the year they were constructed, making them even worse than they were and exposing motorist to avoidable deaths.’’
