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Dangote sets July deadline for N4.3 billion Apapa road project

By Victor Gbonegun
02 July 2018   |   4:11 am
Building and civil engineering firm, AG Dangote Construction Company Limited has attributed the delays in the earlier planned for completion of Apapa/Wharf road reconstruction...

Apapa road

Building and civil engineering firm, AG Dangote Construction Company Limited has attributed the delays in the earlier planned for completion of Apapa/Wharf road reconstruction by end of June, to logistical constraints and heavy presence of underground utilities.

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for reconstruction of the road was signed between the Federal Government, AG.Dangote construction, the Flour Mills of Nigeria and Nigerian Ports Authority, in June, 2017 at the cost of N4.3billion. The company assured motorists and residents that it would be completed by the end of this month.

The Director of Project, AG Dangote Construction Company Limited; Mr. Olatunbosun Kalejaiye, an engineer, made this disclosure during a tour of the project in Apapa at the weekend.

He said: “We have deployed additional pavers to help us recover part of the lost time on this project. At the inception, we discovered a lot of underground utilities including gas pipelines which took about 93days by our records to find a way round it which is about three weeks delay in a twelve months programme. We had the challenge of the raining season, security, potholes on Wharf Road, Traffic issues, logistics and supplies among others”.

“ We have mobilized heavily on the site. We are using a two-prong approach to complete the road. We are moving beyond section four. We have heavy presence of earth equipment and almost done with the installation of the drain and working actively on the pavement work”.

According to him, the focus is to deliver good and quality work by July stressing that the minimum for durability is over 40years according to the pavement design. However he stated that regular road maintenance must be carried out.
“There is commitment from every stakeholder by way of sacrifice to have a good road. Both lanes in the project are cordoned off except for site activities. Other road users have constraint themselves to using alternative route because they believed that when we are done with work, it will be for everybody benefit”.

“The alternative traffic routes include; majorly the Point Road, Liver Pool Road and some part of commercial avenue and we have drawings that shows allowable moment of vehicles that guides everybody. The police, the MOPOL and even the Naval and others, you see them around assisting us”.

Currently, all out-bounds from section1-Four has been completed and the road is about 75 per cent completed while the remaining 25 per cent will be delivered by the end of July, 2018.

To speed up work, the director explained, “The road is divided into four sections to show the complexity and as we are working, the traffic is also moving. Inbound of Section I and section 4 of the project has been completed by the end of June and by the end of July, ”.

Responding to questions on the 43km Nigeria’s longest concrete road project in Obajana/Kabba in Kogi State, he pledged that the project will be delivered by December.

Kalejaiye said so far 29km has been completed.

According to him, the road project was part of the Corporate Social Responsibility (CRS) of the Dangote Cement Plc. Mr. Kalejaiye assured that: “There is nothing to worry. We will deliver the 43km rigid pavement by December.

The General Manager, A.G Dangote Construction Company Limited; Mr. Jimoh Tunji said the road is a 2kilometre project with double lane inbound, outbound and dual carriage way and made up of concrete and rigid pavement.  He said the configuration is about 80cm and first of its kinds in Nigeria considering the peculiarity of traffic on the axis of Lagos.

“It is a high traffic road and has been designed to be able to receive much load. The road has a sub-grade that stabilises the hard core, the impermeable layer which 10cm sand cement, the subsoil drainage for evacuation of water and the stone base which is about 200mm and on the top you have 250mm rigid pavement. We also have an allowance for 50mm asphalt. The road has a shoulder of 2.4metres. The grade of concrete is 40m pascal”.

It would be recalled that as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility (CRS), the Dangote Group had earlier commissioned the 26 km Itori-Ibese Concrete Road.

Worried by the huge sum of money used in road repairs, President of the Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote had said plans were afoot to revolutionize Nigerian roads with concrete, stressing that resources used in road repairs and maintenance would be channeled to other more important needs of the nation.

“We are going to be building concrete roads in the country so that anytime we build a road, we do not have to go back to repair after the third raining season, but move on and use the resources to address other pressing needs of Nigeria,” Mr. Dangote said.

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