The House of Representatives yesterday passed a resolution urging the authorities to repair the roads leading to the Lagos Port Complex, Apapa and the Tin Can Island Port Complex, both in Lagos State.
At the plenary session presided by Speaker Yakubu Dogara, the lawmakers also called on government to reconstruct the Kabba -Obajana road in Kogi State.
The resolutions followed the adoption of motions sponsored by Joseph Ayodeji, APC Lagos and Tajudeen Yusuf, APC Kogi respectively.
Yusuf, while moving the motion expressed concern over the deplorable nature of the Kabba -Obajana road which links the federal capital territory (FCT) to Kogi, Kwara, Ekiti and other states in the South West zone of the country.
He further claimed that motorists now suffer unnecessary delays, leaving them with the option of taking the Lokoja-Okene axis road due to the poor condition of the road.
The House thereby urged the Federal Ministry of Works or the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA) to undertake immediate reconstruction of the Odabudabu bridge at Okebukun as well as beef up security along the Obajana-Kabba road to protect lives and properties of travelers and the affected communities along the route of the road.
On the Apapa port road, the lawmakers resolved to constitute an ad-hoc committee to determine why the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) failed to ensure that the condition for the grant of licences, which included locating tank farms outside the metropolis was kept.
Urging the Federal Ministry of Works to rehabilitate the road and ultimately construct a dedicated bridge for cars and buses only with the aim of restricting trucks and trailers to a dedicated lane to reduce traffic congestion, the lawmakers urged the Federal Ministry of Transport to make the construction of cargo rails an immediate priority in order to drastically reduce the use of trailers in the haulage of goods.
Prior to the adoption of the motion, Joseph said the deplorable nature of the port road is worsening the already chaotic traffic situation in the Apapa area resulting into loss of productive time by people who get stuck in the traffic gridlock.
Copyright Ships & Ports Ltd. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit given to www.shipsandports.com.ng as the source.