The Ogun state government has ordered the contractor handling the Mowe-Ofada road reconstruction in Obafemi-Owode Local Government back to site.

Contract for the reconstruction of the eight kilometers road was awarded by the immediate past administration of Governor Ibikunle Amosun in 2013.

However, the road was abandoned by the contractor, CSCC in 2018, following the failure of the government to defray a sum of N500 million it owed the firm.

The dual carriageway road is now in a dilapidated state with one side impassable.

The state Commissioner for Works and Infrastructure, Engr Ade Akinsanya, who disclosed this in a chat with newsmen, said Governor Dapo Abiodun has approved that the contractor should return to site to complete the reconstruction of the road.

The project, he said, stretched from Ofada Roundabout to Mowe junction, linking the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.

According to Akinsanya, the governor has directed that the contractor should be mobilized to site immediately to complete the project.

The commissioner said the Abiodun administration had taken it upon itself to complete all the abandoned road projects left by the Amosun administration.

Similarly, he said, on account of the creativity and prudence of the current administration, the 42 kilometres Sagamu-Siun-Abeokuta road, which the Amosun administration claimed it awarded at a total cost of N60 billion, but was later abandoned with no work done, is being reconstructed by a firm, Strabic, through two layers (binding and wearing course) at a cost less than N20 billion, including street lighting. 

Akinsanya said the administration had completed the construction of the 19-kilometre Ijebu-Ode/Epe inter-state road, which was handled by Craneburg Limited. The road link Ogun with Lagos state.

The commissioner described the road as the best road project ever constructed in the annals of Nigeria. 

“It is designed to serve as a short cut and also as an alternative route for motorists going to the Southeastern and  the Northern parts of the country, without necessarily passing through the ever-chaotic traffic snarl often encountered along Lagos-Ibadan Expressway,” he said.

Akinsanya noted that roads being reconstructed by the Dapo Abiodun-led administration across the state are of the highest quality that could stand the test of time.

He said the administration was also patronising indigenous contractors, who are being engaged wherever and whenever their services were needed. 

According to Akinsanya, completion of all the inherited abandoned road projects across the three senatorial districts in the state which form part of the infrastructural development agenda of the current administration in the state is aimed at inclusive and participatory governance.

He noted that the legacy projects under construction in the state, when completed, would be commissioned by President Muhammadu Buhari. 

Akinsanya, who also spoke on the rehabilitation of  internal roads across major cities and towns, said that the Ogun State Public Works Agency (OGPWA), headed by Arc. Gbenga Akintola, has been mandated to fix 15 roads on a monthly basis, across the state.

He said, “In the month of August, the agency is poised to rehabilitate 13 roads, with Ogun East taking the lion share of five roads, while Ogun Central and Ogun West have four each.”