Sam Philip
Secretary General of Afenifere, Chief Sola Ebiseni has rejected the exclusion of Ondo State and Niger Delta states from the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway project.
He warned that Ondo State and other oil-producing states would not accept the alleged exclusion of their coastal lines in the mega project.
Speaking with journalists in Akure, Ondo State capital on Tuesday, Ebiseni queried why the states producing oil from which funds for the project came from would be excluded from such economic-oriented infrastructure.
He noted that the statement allegedly credited to the Minister of Works, David Umahi in the media that the Coastal Highway would not follow Ondo and Delta states is responsible for critics of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu describing the project as a scam.
The Secretary General of Afenifere said: “I personally noticed some monumental initiatives, particularly in the area of road infrastructural development but regrettably the efforts are bedevilled by too much noise-making, undue politicisation and policy somersault.
“Take the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway for instance. We have archival records that the road has been proposed around 1900 when the Ilaje coastal territory of the present Ondo State was still part of Lagos Colony.
“There was already a telegraphic line which connected Lagos through Ilaje to Warri along the Atlantic corridor.
“The road was designed in alignment with the telegraphic route to link Lagos Colony with the Southern Protectorate which headquarters was then incidentally at Calabar.
“An agreement to that effect was reached in 1900 when Sir William Macgregor, Governor of Lagos Colony was on tour of the Ilaje eastern boundary of the Colony up to around the Benin River in Warri Division.
“The document was later signed on the 12th January 1904 between Sir William Macgregor Governor of Lagos Colony and Sir Wyndham Roseberry of Southern Protectorate.
“President Tinubu has taken such a bold step in launching this historic road project which, if faithfully implemented, will be the most monumental particularly in the Niger Delta.
“But suddenly and most annoyingly, we now hear the Minister of Works in the media that the road will only follow the coastal route in the Lagos area but that the alignment will no longer follow the coastline from Ondo State to Delta and so on.
“Who takes such nonsense from government? Why would Tinubu not be accused that the road is only a scam to open up more coastal real estate business in Lagos.
“The question being asked now is why the road should become impossible in the oil-producing areas that provide the fund?
“Why make the people of the coastal area happy about road development in their area only for the Works Minister to arrogantly tell us that the road is impossible in our territory.
“Incidentally, the potential for coastal business and several advantages available in Lagos are more in these virgin areas.
“It is better for the President to live for posterity than allow himself derail on the altar of political expediency.
“The initiative of Reno Omokiri on his fact-finding tour of the road. It communicates better than the sounds and fury in government circles.”