Reps task Fashola on repair of Onitsha-Owerri highway, others

The House of Representatives, has urged Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, to urgently commence emergency repairs of the failed portion of Onitsha-Owerri expressway and bad portions of other federal roads with similar conditions across the country.

While directing the minister to investigate the ongoing failure of strategic portions of the Enugu-Port Harcourt expressway as the contractor is still carrying out rehabilitation works, the House urged him to also look into the abandonment of the rehabilitation of the Enugu-Onitsha expressway which has led to the gory condition of the section of the road.
This was sequel to a motion Wednesday, jointly sponsored under matters of urgent public importance by Deputy Minority Leader of the House, Toby Okechukwu, and all members from the South East region of the country.

Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila and his deputy, Idris Wase were later joined as co sponsors on the floor.


Moving the motion on behalf of others, Okechukwu noted that a gully suddenly emerged on the Onitsha-Owerri Expressway around Oraifute, Ekwusigo local government area of Anambra state, a development that cut the expressway into two parts leading to the entrapment of a fuel tanker laden with diesel inside the gully.

He said: “It took the intervention of personnel of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) to ensure that the content of the trapped tanker was trans-loaded while the remaining portion of the road remains closed, to avoid loss of lives.”

He pointed out that the Onitsha–Owerri Expressway offers a bypass to several communities in the South-east as well as connects the South-east and South-south geopolitical zones of the country.
The lawmaker expressed worries that the present condition of the road has made the road completely impassable as same poses great hardship to motorists, other road users, host communities and constitutes threat to the lives of the people, hence the need for urgent government intervention.
He said : “Several portions of the Enugu-Port Harcourt Expressway are failing even while the contractors are still on the site.”

He added that the rehabilitation works on the Enugu-Onitsha Expressway has been abandoned as evident in the immense hardship being experienced by motorists and other road users in the Amansea section of the road.