The Minister of Works, David Umahi, revealed that the construction expenses for the Lagos-Calabar highway amount to ₦4 billion per kilometer.
Previously, Atiku Abubakar criticized the project, alleging that the Federal Government intended to spend ₦8 billion per kilometer on the 700 km road project. He also questioned why President Bola Tinubu awarded the contract to his ally, Gilbert Chagoury’s Hitech without competitive bidding. Umahi, in response, criticized Atiku for his lack of understanding of figures and found his comments degrading.
Additionally, the minister, while speaking on Television Continental on April 10, 2024, refuted Atiku’s claim regarding the project’s cost, explaining the differences in the current road design compared to the original plan.
“The coastal road we are constructing has a total of 10 lanes, you know, not only that it has a total of 10 lanes, it also have what we called shoulders. And the total shoulders can be put at about 23 metres. So when you put the total concrete pavement we are doing, it’s about 59 metres. When you put the total flexible pavement that he quoted it’s about 23 metres,” Umahi said.
“And so when you run the figures, you now find out that under his calculation, it is giving you about over ₦19bn per kilometre. Now if you divide it by the 23 kilometres that they are doing, it is about 2.225 times a standard superhighway carriageway, which is ₦11.55bn. Whereas what we are doing, if you divide it, you get ₦5.167bn, So when you now divide using our 1.067, you get about ₦4bn/km.
“If you go back to what he has quoted, you will get over ₦8bn. So using concrete, which should be more expensive because of the kind of terrain we have, and using flexible pavement, which shouldn’t stand the coastal route, you will find out that our cost is ₦4bn instead of the ₦8bn claimed by the former vice president.”
The ex-Governor of Ebonyi State revealed that Hitech Construction would finance the project utilizing the Public-Private Partnership model.
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