The Pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, has faulted the Federal Government over the realignment of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway along the Ondo and Delta states corridors.

While alleging that the Minister of Works, Dave Umahi, is insincere regarding the project, the organisation stated that with the project redirected from the coastlines of the two states, it raises suspicions, particularly regarding the proper execution of the highway project within the Lagos State axis.

Speaking with newsmen at the Akure Airport, Ondo State, the Secretary General of the organisation, Sola Ebiseni, described as unimaginable that the states whose resources were deployed for the project are being shortchanged. At the same time, Lagos was duly factored into the initial concept of the project.

Ebiseni emphasised that archival records indicated that the road had been proposed around 1900, when the Ilaje coastal territory of the present Ondo State was still part of Lagos Colony.

He said, “The road was designed in alignment with the telegraphic route to link Lagos Colony with the Southern Protectorate, whose headquarters was then incidentally at Calabar. An agreement to that effect was reached in 1900 when Sir William MacGregor, Governor of the Lagos Colony, was on a tour of the Ilaje eastern boundary of the Colony, up to around the Benin River in the Warri Division.

“The document was later signed on the 12th of January, 1904, between Sir William MacGregor, Governor of Lagos Colony, and Sir Wyndham Roseberry of Southern Protectorate. President Tinubu has taken a bold step in launching this historic road project, which, if faithfully implemented, will be one of 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 the government?

“Why would Tinubu not be accused of the fact that the road is only a scam to open up more coastal real estate business in Lagos? My brother, the question being asked now is why the road should become impossible in the oil-producing areas that provide the funds?

“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 to derail on the altar of political expediency. The initiative of Reno Omokri on his fact-finding tour of the road communicates better than the sounds and fury in government circles.”

Meanwhile, the Afenifere’s scribe, who spoke on the issues surrounding the group, particularly the recent appointments made by the organisation’s leadership, stated that no viable organisation, including political parties, is spared the bug of centrifugal forces today in the country.

Ebiseni stressed that Oba Oladipo Olaitan, as the new leader, has what it takes to navigate and ensure unity in the organisation, adding that his emergence naturally solved the rumpus within the organisation.

“Afenifere is a welfarist socio-political organisation whose ideological stance it has maintained since 1951 with an unambiguous position on national issues. At critical times in our national life, the Action Group, UPN, SDP/NADECO, AD, and AD/APP have all faced contestations on ideological grounds, which have always been resolved according to Awolowo’s understanding of the interplay between thesis and antithesis.

“The current disagreement is not so deep, in my view. It is between strict adherence to its historical socio-political character and Awolowo’s political worldview, and the new romance with being a Yoruba socio-cultural organisation of all comers.

“A monopoly of the position of the Leader by the Lagos/Ogun and Ondo/Ekiti axis from founder Chief Obafemi Awolowo in 1951 to Chief Michael Adekunle Ajasin, Abraham Adesanya, Reuben Fasoranti and Ayo Adebanjo. Leadership has now moved to the Oyo/Osun axis as envisioned by Pa Fasoranti,” he said.