From January 2017 to date hundreds of lives were lost to accidents in the road. For instance, on Friday 10th February, 2017 alone, about 22 lives were lost in the Kano-Kaduna road. Millions of naira has been lost as properties and vehicles destroyed.
Kano is the centre of commerce of the North and second largest in the country. People all over troop to purchase and transact businesses and transport the goods to Kaduna, Abuja, Niger, Nasarawa and even Kogi, making use of the road on a daily basis.
Be that as it may, the unfortunate part of all this is there is no functional train service as a mode of transportation between Kano and Kaduna which would have reduced the loss of lives and properties as well as pressure on the road.
Works and Power Minister, Babatunde Fashola, in a statement while marking his one year in office said expansion and rehabilitation work on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway would be completed soon. But Kano-Kaduna road has been in bad state without even the slightest show of concern from the political office holders from either Kano or Jigawa states or the federal government.
Although the Federal road maintenance agency zonal Director in February said five roads would be rehabilitated in Kano State at the cost of over N720 million, which will see roads like the Kano-Gwarzo-Dayi, Tiga-Doguwa, Karaye-Rogo, Lajawa-Gamarya-Masuba and Kwanar Maroko-Maroko roads being accorded the long overdue attention.
But it is surprising that the ministry has forgotten the main highway that connects the state with people coming from north central and southern part of the country.
In the past, the Federal Road Maintenance Agency, FERMA, used to fix the potholes in the federal roads but they have now found themselves handicapped with finances and therefore no longer effect such repairs.
If Federal government can continue to rehabilitate roads in the southern part of the country, as we have seen the minister is doing, the saying goes thus: ‘what is good for the goose is good for gander’.
Alhassan A. Bala,
Abuja, [email protected]
