…says road may not last three months
People of Erio Ekiti in Ekiti West Local Government Area of Ekiti State have called on the State and the Federal Governments to look into the poor handling of the contractors handling the road projects in the town by the contractor in charge.
The community fear that the federal road under construction may not last the next three months because of the shoddy jobs as well as substandard materials being used.
The people who gathered to protest the various negative impacts of the bad road on the lives of the inhabitants and other road users coupled with the slow pace of work alleged the contractor of using direct human labour without any machine for the construction.
They explained that the town had been completely cut off from other towns in the State for the past two months.
In an interview, the President of Erio-Ekiti Development Union (EDU), Elder Akin Adeniji, who led Newsmen on a site seeing to various failed portions and constructions on the federal road, said the town had been completely cut off by the Contractors, a situation which poses security dangers to residents.
He expressed worry over the poor way the contractors had been executing the road projects which had caused a delay, moreso that the contractors had not provided any alternative routes, and were using direct human labour which was making the jobs go at a very slow pace.
Elder Adeniji lamented that the hardship, danger and anxiety caused to the people in the last two months were no longer bearable hence the need for government to quickly salvage the situation.
The EDU National President, who said that the Union had written official letters to the Federal Ministry of works and Housing as well as the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA) on the matter, appealed to government to quickly rescue the town from fears of insecurity and denial of accessibility.
In his words, Elder Akin Adeniji said, “As we speak today, Erio-Ekiti is practically cut off from the geographical map of Nigeria. Erio-Ekiti Community is a cul-de-sac and inaccessible. FERMA decided to cut Erio-Ekiti off from the rest of the world all in the name of fixing culverts and constructing drainages instead of executing the projects in phases so that there could be room for vehicular movements.
Erio-Ekiti has been cut off at two spots: one at the Junction of Oke-Opa (before you enter Erio-Ekiti) and the other at Obarabara River on your way to Aramoko-Ekiti.
Currently, no vehicle can enter or leave Erio-Ekiti and that is why we are seriously worried. Again, the poor quality of jobs done on both the culverts as well as the drainages is a threat to the road. It could again collapse within a short spell of time.
We want to draw the attention of Federal Ministry of Works and Housing, FERMA and by extension, the Contractors to this very poor jobs execution. We demand that the entire portion of Erio-Ekiti road (which is just about 15 Kilometers) must be reconstructed.
The Vendors must be brought back to cite so as correct the poor jobs they did.
FERMA Officials should insist on maintaining the standards expected of a Trunk “A” road like ours and should not allow the Contractors to spoil their good image. Apart from reconstructing the length and breadth of Erio-Ekiti portion of the road, all the Culverts and Drainages must be done to meet the required standard of a Trunk A road so as to withstand the test of time.”
Other residents of the town who spoke included Chief Eruku, Alhaji Lawal, the Elemikan, Chief Ojo Timothy Funsho and Mr. Akanni Akinjobi aka Onile who explained that since the road had been closed months ago, the negative impacts were much on their economy, health emergencies and education, as school children faced hardship getting to school because the road had been cut off..
They called on government to do a proper Monitoring of the Contractors or revoke the contracts as the job could not be said to be done to specification.