Despite the Minister of Works, David Umahi’s promise that all federal roads would be made motorable by Christmas, many of federal roads have remained in deplorable situation.

The Guardian gathered that motorists travelling to different parts of the country had harrowing experiences plying most of the roads and journeys that should take four or eight hours stretched to 12 hours, forcing transport companies to raise fares in different parts of the country.

Umahi had, during a stakeholders’ town hall meeting, organised by the Ministry of Works in Akure, Ondo State, stated that federal road controllers had been instructed to report the conditions of roads in their areas to ensure that by Christmas, all federal highways would be in useable condition.

However, many of the roads remained untouched and construction equipment could not be sighted in most of the roads. Among the roads that are impassible or partially in disrepair are Sagamu-Ore Expressway; old Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway by Ile Zik; Okigwe-Akaeze-Afikpo federal road; Umuahia-Ikot Ekpene federal highway; Enugu-Oturkpo-Makurdi Highway, and Onitsha-Owerri, Owerri – Umuahia Road, as well as Itanla-Ile-Oluji-Ipetu Expressway and Port Harcourt-Owerri Road.

An engineer, Nnamdi Kevin, said the minister should explain to the people of South-East why there was no presence of the Federal Road Maintenance Agency on their roads.

“Before, FERMA would be finding solutions to bad portions of roads to make them motorable, but it is no longer the case under this administration,” he said.

The minister has been facing scrutiny by the House of Representatives over expenditure on roads and concentration on less priority issues. Chairman, House Committee on Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA), Aderemi Oseni, accused the minister of misplacing his priority and failing to fix the roads.

According to him, if the minister was addressing existing roads with the resources in his disposal, the problems won’t arise across the country. He argued that Umahi’s excuse that resources were a factor was unfounded, as the ministry got N300 billion supplementary approval and could not use it to repair the roads.

“Last year, you got N300 billion supplementary budget approval. I am worried that you are not concerned about fixing Nigerian roads,” Oseni said. In response, Umahi denied the accusations, saying the evidence of construction work done with the supplementary budget were there to be viewed by the lawmakers.