Oyetola seeks FG, states collaboration on Nigerian roads

Gov. Adegboyega Oyetola of Osun on Thursday, sought for more collaboration between Federal and State Governments towards fixing Nigerian roads.

He made the call when he received members of the Senate Committee on Works led by Sen. Adamu Aliero who paid him a courtesy visit in Osogbo.

While stressing the need to collaborate with one another to ensure that the roads were fixed, Oyetola said that the issue of infrastructure had been a major problem to virtually every part of the country.

“It is not out of place to actually declare a state of emergency on infrastructure. We have been doing so much; even the previous administration did quite a lot but its like we have not done anything at all.

“The movement of goods and services must not be hindered. If you don’t maintain infrastructure to support economic development, it is a waste of time.

“There must be adequate infrastructure to support economic development. We are doing a lot of work on roads and we must commend the federal government for the support.

“We are doing a lot to ensure that we make our roads motor-able. In any case the citizens don’t know which road is federal or states. What they want is good roads,” he said.

He further said that the era of expecting whether the Federal or State Government to be able to solve all problems did not arise and called for public-private partnership to fix the bad roads.

Speaking, Aliero said that the level of infrastructure deficit in the country was high and that budgetary allocations could not fund all ongoing road projects.

He called for the exploration of Pension Fund, infrastructure bond among others to take care of some of the roads.

“Pension fund is about N43 trillion. We don’t see why the fund should not be used to rehabilitate our roads. After all, the money is not required at once. It will take about 15 to 20 years before such money can be required to be paid to pensioners.

“If we use just use 20 per cent of that amount, it will go a long way to solving the problem of the road sector,” he said.

He said that they were in the state to inspect seven road projects including the rehabilitation of Ekan Meje road to Kwara border which was awarded on May 24, 2018 at N5.3 billion, the rehabilitation of Osogbo-Ilesha road which was awarded at N2.8 billion.

“The rehabilitation of Ibadan-Ife-Ilesha dualisation was awarded recently at the cost of N79 billion.

“The inspection of these roads by members of the committee is done so that when we are allocating money we will know the projects we are allocating for.

“In essence, the visit is to ensure we get value for money and for Nigerians to benefit from what the federal government is doing.

”Some of these projects could have being going on for quite a long time. They could not be completed because of paucity of funds,” he said.

It was reported that the committee also inspected the Lagos-Ibadan Carriageway Section 2.

The road is being funded by the Presidential Infrastructure Development Fund (PIDF) and the Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA).