For decades, a hundred kilometres Enugu-Onitsha Expressway has been in a deplorable and dilapidated state, causing discomfort and dislocations to thousands of its users, such as constant breakdown of vehicles, accidents that resulted in several deaths, destruction of valuable goods and property, including foodstuffs and other commodities.
Many people have been bandying different stories as to the reason why that road has been abandoned. While some people attribute it to the usual neglect of roads in the South East by the federal government, such as the Onitsha-Owerri road, Owerri-Okigwe road, Enugu-Port Harcourt road, etc.; others claim that contract for the repair of Enugu-Onitsha road was actually awarded, but that the money was embezzled by some South-East politicians.
But if, indeed, the federal government had actually awarded the contract for the reconstruction of that road and somebody “ate” the money, what is the EFCC doing to arrest the man and recover the money? That is why we are having a double mind about the story.
Other people also accuse those who represent the South East at the federal level, those who held and still hold key positions in authorities, like Vice President, Senate President, Deputy Senate President, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Deputy Speaker, Secretary to the Authorities of the Federation (SGF), Ministers, etc., however, didn’t do what they have been supposed to do. As a result of these men and women of timber and calibre fly in and out of the South East each time they want to travel, they would not remember the fate of the ordinary citizens who travel by road.
When the Akanu Ibiam International Airport, Enugu, was closed, everyone was shouting, and it didn’t take long before the federal government rose to the occasion and obtained the airport fixed. However, these representatives of the South East in government hardly raise any voice about the deplorable state of Enugu-Onitsha. That’s the type of representatives now we have in authorities.
The Enugu-Onitsha expressway which was said by the Obasanjo army administration in the mid-Nineteen1970s, and was considerably improved upon by the Shagari civilian government between 1979 and 1983, was never fully accomplished and officially commissioned before the army struck again in December 1983. However, due to the significance of the road to the economic system of the South East, and certainly, all Nigerians, people began utilizing it.
The Enugu-Onitsha road isn’t just one small road tucked away somewhere in the South East. It is a major federal highway connecting the South-West through the River Niger to the South-East, South-South, and Northern Nigeria, through Benue and Kogi States.
The road is a vital artery of commerce, tradition and race. Even as important because of the road to the economic viability, cultural integration and national planning of Nigeria, the highway has since virtually ceased to exist. It’s encumbered by deep gullies, pot-holes, thorn-bushes, thistles and craters which have now rendered the expressway impassable.
Over the years, we usually see some road construction equipment, such as bulldozers, caterpillars, etc., mounted on the expressway to present the impression that reconstruction work was going on, whereas there could be nothing to that effect.
From the Enugu axis, starting from the eighty-two Division, Nigerian Military Headquarters, to the Ninth Mile Corner, linking the Southern and Northern parts of the nation, the Enugu-Onitsha Expressway, is a big embarrassment to many of its users. The road has worn out dangerously to the extent of being abandoned only to articulated vehicles and tankers, apart from the ubiquitous Fulani herders and their cows.
Very often, one or two of these articulated vehicles would fell off and cover the entire stretch of the road, and every movement would be halted. The matter is not helped by troopers who mount checkpoints, collecting N500 and N1000 before permitting any vehicle to cross, thus growing the agony of the commuters.
If not for the excellent work achieved by the Enugu State authorities led by Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, in rehabilitating Milliken Hill, many people would have been trapped inside Enugu Coal City, since no small vehicle would attempt plying that death trap through Ugwu Onyeama.
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Just a few days ago, there seems to be a ray of hope, when we heard over the information that the federal government had approved the sum of N8.6 billion for the completion of work on the Enugu-Onitsha highway
According to the story, Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, who was stated to have made the announcement at the end of the Federal Executive Council assembly in Abuja, stated: “The Ministry of Works and Housing presented one memorandum to council, which was for the revised estimate total cost for our project on the Enugu-Onitsha freeway, it was so as to add the sum of N8.649 billion for a 22-kilometre part of the 100-kilometre road so that we can expedite the conclusion of labour there.
“The variation is to cater for change of the pavement surface, binder cost and the wiring cost, to extend the thickness and also to utilise the modified bitumen in addition to strengthen the shoulders and some bridgework. So, the Council approved this variation of N8.649 billion.”
While this can be cheery news to many users of the road, we however have our reservation, because as we have often been told; “approval is not released”. We have had many approvals that only ended in the sheet of papers on which they were written, with no cash backing. In the end, everything will come to nought.
In other words, we will not rejoice, nor sing alleluia until we see appreciable work done on the road. Even at that, we will still hold our breath, until the entire stretch of the road is accomplished since we have never been comfortable with the haphazard method the project was being executed.
The Enugu-Onitsha Expressway is one of the busiest roads in the nation, but it remains the least to receive federal government attention in terms of making it motorable. Of all of the three former regional capitals, Enugu is the one people discover it most difficult to enter by the road.
