New Telegraph

FG mulls new measures to preserve highways

N282.6 bn planned for 2022Wizkid

The Federal Government is considering new measures of preserving quality of roads in major highways across the country for longer life span, New Telegraph was informed. The government, a senior official at the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing hinted New Telegraph, was worried about the intense pressure on major highways on account of overload. Some new measures being mulled by the Ministry of Works and Housing include producing weigh bridges with a view to curtailing excess load on the nation’s roads.

Excess load on highways is said to be a major cause of dilapidating state of roads in Nigeria. The government is commiting huge funds to fixing Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, had said that the sum of N1.3 trillion was required to fix roads in 2022 when he appeared recently before the House of Representatives Committee on Works to defend the allocation to the ministry in the 2022 budget. Speaking to New Telegraph in Abuja on the sidelines of Debt Management Office ( DMO) N250 billion Sukuk bond for the construction of roads across the six geo-politcal zones of the country, Deputy Director, Highway Planning & Development at Federal Ministry of Works and Housing, Engr. Tiltong Dachi David, said government was worried about the life span of roads. He attributed collapse of the roads to heavy trucks carrying excess loads above the required capacity.

“One of the major problems of roads in Nigeria is overloading by trucks. Those are designed for 30,000 tons maximum, but you have a truck carrying 40,000 tons, 60,000 tons. That is the major problem of our road degeneration in Nigeria. “For each of these Sukuk project, there is a laboratory test on road before construction is undertaken There is quality team in the ministry, the evaluation unit.

They go there.There is also department of geometric, they also check for every material you submit for project for verification. “On our side, we are doing all we can to maintain the standard of these works. Like I said, motorist don’t adhere to loading structure of the road. Thankfully, government is working to produce way bridges. We are hoping that it will curtail issue of excesses load on our roads,” David clarified. The allocation to Ministry of Works and Housing in the 2022 budget is N450 billion out of which N282.6 billion is proposed for the execution of road projects. The minister decried the low budgetary allocations to road construction in Nigeria. Fashola said the country needed N1.3 trillion to fix roads in 2022 and that to salvage the situation, the government had resolved to prioritise some major projects.

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