Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo state through his Commissioner for Public Work and Transports, Professor Dahud Kehinde Shangodoyin, on Friday afternoon while inspecting the ongoing reconstruction of Saki-Ogboro- Igboho road had expressed his displeasure over the slow phase of work on that corridor. He therefore warned no more excuses will be accepted. In addition, he gave direct and express instruction to the Construction Company to ensure the road is delivered before December 2022.
It is on record that the reconstruction work of the 45 Kilometre road was awarded to the Chinese Civil Engineering Construction Company(CCECC) in March 2021 with a mandate and commitment to ensure the road reconstruction was completed by March 2022, which is a 12-month target.
The commissioner on inspection tour of the area today expressed displeasure that after 16 months the 45 Kilometre road construction is still in a slow phase. Prof Shangodyin said “ You will have to speed up work on this and make sure the road is completed before December 2022 or else the government will have no choice than to terminate the contract.”
“The State Government has a mandate to fulfil as it had d promised the people of Saki and its environs that they must begin to enjoy in a new way the dividends of good governance by making sure the road is ready before the end of the third quarter” said Prof Shangodoyin
The Saki-Ogboro-Igboho road construction contract has in its terms construction of 45 kilometres road long includes asphalt laying, 7.5 width, with the shoulder at 1.5 As at the time of Prof Shangodoyin’s inspection the Contractor has essentially completed 95% of the line drain but in term of asphalt and overlaying regulation the work done by CCECC stood at only 39%.
It was based on this slow phase that the Commissioner was angry because according to him, the extended contract signed was that July 2022, the whole construction would have finished and the project commissioned or at least handed over to the state government
The Personnel and Site manager, Mr Afolabi Azeez in his response apologized for the slow phase of the work, did explain that the skyrocket rise in the cost of materials, which is not peculiar to Nigeria alone, majorly accounted for slow pace of work. But in spite of all these challenges Mr Afolabi Afeex assured the state government that the work will be delivered as expected.
But while acknowledge the challenges faced by the Construction Company, Prof. Shangodoyin on behalf of the state government maintained “Despite the limitations expressed by the construction company, it is obvious the company’s performance is low. The capacity deployed here on the job is not encouraging in terms of technicality they have.” It is also obvious “The construction company is not putting their own resources on this job, if they have done so the work would have moved faster than this”. Prof Shangodoyin.
While concluding his tour and inspection Professor Shangodoyin then appealed to the people of Saki and environs to continue to believe in the capacity of the state government to deliver on its promised as well as to be law abiding citizens of the state .
Prof Shangodoyin also stated it is clear “Many factors always contributed to delays in engineering work, but that the state government while working with the construction firm will ensure the road reconstruction work would be ready for the use of the populace at the promised time”.
