The Federal Executive Council (FEC) has given its approval for the award of contract on the full scope development of arterial road from Northern Parkway Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Way to the Northern Express Way (ONEX)/Muritala Mohammed Way-North within the Federal Capital City, Abuja.
The Minister of FCT, Mohammed Bello, who disclosed this Wednesday while speaking with State House correspondents at the end of the weekly FEC meeting, said the contract was awarded to Gilmor Engineering Nig. Ltd, at the cost of N30,686,609,298.68 with a completion period of 32 months.
Bello said: “Federal Executive Council (FEC) approved the award of contract for the full scope development of Arterial Road N20, from Northern Parkway (N8) Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Way to the Northern Express Way (ONEX)/Muritala Mohammed Way-North with the Federal Capital City, Abuja.”
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The minister stressed that the project area is within Phase II of the FCC serving as a boundary road between the adjoining districts of Mabushi, Kado, Katampe and Jabi.
He added that the project would improve access to the above-mentioned districts, improve security, while also providing employment for both skilled and unskilled workers.
Bello said the road project would further enhance the overall decongestion of traffic in phases I, II, III, IV of the Federal Capital City.
Also, the Minister of Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, said his ministry presented two memoranda, adding that the memoranda relate to commitment on policy directive to complete existing projects.
He said: “The first one related to the Oyo -Ogbomosho highway, which is the 52 kilometres part of the Ilorin – Ibadan 145 kilometres highway. The remaining part is the Oyo to Ogbomoso part which is 52 kilometres.
“We needed to adjust some things in the scope of work, the thickness of the pavement from 500mm to 560mm to also change the asphalt to polymer-modified bitumen and also the shoulders from surface dressing to fully asphalted inside and outside shoulder.
“So, all these required changes in prices of N47.504 billion and this has increased the total contract to N105.041 billion.”
Fashola stressed that this was the revision that he presented which was approved by FEC.
He noted that the road project were awarded in 2010, adding that sections 1 & 3 were completed and government is also trying to complete the section 2 which it inherited.
Fashola explained that another project that the current administration is trying to complete is the Lokko-Oweto Bridge, which links Nasarawa and Benue States and provides a major time saving detour, about four hours, for people trying to come from the South-south, Benue, through to Nasarawa to Abuja.
He said: “The project was awarded in 2011 and it was awarded in three different sections. One section, the road from Benue to Oweto was awarded to one contractor, we have completed that road; the bridge was awarded to another contractor, the bridge is essentially finished now, its open to traffic and then the Loko to Nasarawa 74-kilometre road was awarded to another contractor. We are trying to sort out that problem and we will come back to it.
“So, the approval given today was a N9.348 billion variation to complete the bridge component or remaining work on the bridge. If you go there now, it’s already opened to traffic, finishing and work to link the existing road in the Benue side to the bridge is what we got this variation for.
“So, changes in contract price from N51.621 billion to N60.961 billion. As I said, even though we haven’t finished the road side on the Nasarawa side, the commuters are already using the road because it provides a huge detour going through Lafia, Kerri to come to Nasarawa and to Abuja.”
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