Lagos State has injected N19.4 billion into the construction of 114 inner roads, Governor Akinwunmi Ambode said yesterday.
The roads are spread across the 20 local governments and the 37 local council development areas (LCDAs).
Ambode, who spoke at the inauguration of the roads held simultaneously in 10 local governments, said residents must guard the infrastructure provided by his administration jealously.
The governor was represented by his commissioners, monarchs and All Progressives Congress (APC) leaders at the inauguration of the projects.
He assured the people that more projects would follow those already completed.
At the inauguration of Etal Memunat and Omolanke roads in Onigbongbo Local Council Development Area yesterday, Ambode was represented by the Head of Service, Mrs. Olabowale Ademola and the Special Adviser to the Governor on Central Business District, Mr. Agbola Dabiri.
He said the projects provided direct employment for over 5,000 construction professionals and artisans and indirectly to over 10,000 others.
The governor said the road projects were completed to fulfil his electoral promise to the people.
He added that the administration remains committed to the concept of inclusive governance, where government policies, projects and programmes would be driven by the needs of the community.
He said the roads span across 56.1 kilometres with 112 kilometres walkways and drainages and 56 kilometres of independently powered street lights that would help enhance the security and elevate the state mega city status.
“We started this journey by asking our Community Development Associations (CDAs) to identify the roads in need of improvement in their areas. We received hundreds of requests and picked two per each local government to make 114 roads across the state.”
The governor explained that to ensure transparency and accountability, the government established a bidding process in line with international best practices that produced 89 indigenous contractors that handled the construction.
He hailed the contractors for living up to expectations and delivering the project on time.
“I want to thank our local contractors for delivering on this project and demonstrating the capacity of the construction industry in Lagos. I thanked the community leaders and officers, who monitored the project and the CDA members that persuaded their members to shift fences to allow roads to be expanded and resolve issues that might have stalled the projects.”
The Sole Administrators of the LDA, Mr. Shamsideen Oloyede, said the construction of the roads would ease the challenges of gridlock and help improve the security in the area.
Oloyode appealed to residents to take advantage of the opportunity by maintaining the infrastructure so as to attract other projects.
“We should let our maintenance culture be rife to preserve the highly capital intensive projects being commissioned statewide,” he said.
A member of the residents association, Mr. Ibukunoluwa, thanked the governor for ending what he described as eight years of pain.
He said the deplorable state of the road has been a big challenge to residents, adding that what they could not achieve within the last eight years had been fixed by the governor in just six months.
He assured the governor that the infrastructure would be protected, pledging support for the administration.
Twenty roads from 10 local governments were inaugurated yesterday.
They include Temidire and Molade Streets in Ajeromi, Erejuwa and Omitogun/Igbosere Street, Yaba; Matthew and Famuyiwa Street, Agege; Ademola Abiola and Bioyin Street, Ojokoro; Adeniji Oluwakemi and Bolaji Benson, Ikorodu central among others.
