Deplorable Federal Roads: Release funds to FERMA, Senate tells Finance Ministry

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The Senate has called on the Federal Ministry of Finance to urgently release adequate funds to the Federal Road Maintenance Agency (FERMA) for the purpose of carrying out emergency repairs on all dilapidated federal roads in the country.

The Senate went further to urge the Federal Government to immediately declare a state of emergency on federal roads and improve its funding.

These formed part of resolutions reached by the chamber following a motion considered during plenary on Tuesday.

Sponsored by Senator Gershom Bassey, it is titled: “Motion on Nigeria’s Bad Roads And NUPENG’S Impending Nationwide Strike”. Coming under Order 42 and 52 of the Senate Standing Orders, Bassey noted that the 36,000 km federal road network is the largest and most valuable single public infrastructure asset owned by the government of Nigeria.

According to Senator Gershom Bassey, “the deplorable state of the federal roads in Nigeria has become a national shame and an unnecessary embarrassment as scores of innocent people are kidnapped by bandits, robbed, mutilated and killed daily in avoidable accidents on account of bad federal roads.”

He lamented that the Petroleum Tanker Drivers branch of the Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas (NUPENG) workers have threatened to cripple the Nigerian economy by a nationwide strike if the bad and shameful roads are not properly fixed.

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The lawmaker recalled that in 2019, he made a similar call through a motion for increased funding for maintenance and rehabilitation of the country’s federal highways. He expressed worry that despite several calls, there has not been improved funding for maintenance and rehabilitation of highways.

Bassey disclosed that the federal highways in Nigeria require the sum of about N215 billion per annum to revamp 3,500km of federal roads for 8-10 years for total rehabilitation to be achieved.  He lamented that between 2016-2020, the actual funds released to FERMA by the federal government for road rehabilitation and maintenance was just about 17 percent of the required sum.

He added that poor funding and neglect of Nigerian roads have led to the abysmal state of federal roads in the country.

The Senate in its resolutions accordingly urged the Federal Ministry of Finance to immediately as a matter of urgent national importance release adequate funding to the Federal Road Maintenance Agency to urgently carry out emergency repairs on all federal roads across the country.

The chamber also urged the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing to immediately introduce weigh-bridges on relevant portions of all Federal highways to check the overloading of trucks and tankers beyond the engineers’ load-bearing capacity of such roads.

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