The Senate Committee on the Federal Capital Territory has directed the FCT Minister, Senator Bala Muhammed, to appear before it to explain the construction of open drainage system on the Umar Musa Yar’Adua Expressroad, Abuja.
The Minister is to appear before the Committee soon after the Senate resumes from the Easter holidays.
The firm handling the rehabilitation and expansion of the road, Messrs Julius Berger Nigeria Plc, was also directed to appear before the committee.
The Chairman of the committee, Senator Smart Adeyemi (PDP-Kogi), issued the directive on Thursday during the an oversight tour of the road’s expansion project in Abuja.
Adeyemi observed that despite the huge contract sum allocated to the project, the construction firm built open drains, which had caused fatal accidents as motorists crashed into them on daily basis.
He noted that while the quality of work on the road was commendable, the contractor must find a means of closing the drains, because they are not befitting for the nation’s capital city.
Adeyemi said the contractor should bear the cost of constructing covered drains as part of its corporate social responsibility since it sourced free raw materials from the immediate environment.
He said: “They have done a good job except for the open drainage.
”Whatever is to be done on the road must be done before the completion of project, if not, we will withhold your payment.
“There is no city in the world where drainages are left open.
“Even in many states where you have projects, you are not doing open culverts.
“So, why in the FCT?
“These drainage constitutes a health hazard to our people.
“This is not acceptable to us at all.
“It is a death trap and we must sit down and talk on the likely solution.
“The total cost of construction is high, yet you extracted free granite stone, laterite and water for use on the project.
“You must do something about it.
“If not, we will use our powers to compel you to do something.
“It is very uncivilised.”
Also speaking, Senator Nurudeen Abatemi-Usman (PDP-Kogi) said there was plenty of room for improvement on the level of work done by the contractors.
Abatemi-Usman also stressed that the need to review the open drainage and reconstruct modern drainage system to conform with current designs obtainable in major cities of the world.
He said: “There is a lot of appreciation of the work done but there is also a lot of room for improvement.
“Particular reference is the open drainage style, which is turning out to be an unintended death trap.
“We would want to meet with the relevant authority over this design and see what we can do on behalf of the people of the nation.
“Something needs to be done and urgently too.”
Earlier, the Director of Engineering, Federal Capital Territory Administration, Abu Alfa, told the senators that the contract was categorised into Lot 1 and Lot 2.
Alfa said the contract for Lot 1 and Lot 2 was awarded in 2009 at the cost of N49 billion and N59.2 billion respectively.
He said Lot 2, which was 99.5 per cent completed, would be delivered at the end of this month, while Lot 1 was expected for completion in December 2014.
On the open drains, the director said the construction was based on designs drawn in 1991.
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