Trans-West African Highway gets pan-regional presidential nod to begin in 2014

The Trans-West African Highway, also known as Lagos-Abidjan Road, has received the blessing of the Presidents of five West African nations for construction to begin in 2014.
This was disclosed by the Minister of Works, Mike Onolememen, on Wednesday in Abuja while fielding questions at a News Agency of Nigeria Forum.
Onolememen said that the five countries were Nigeria, Benin Republic, Togo, Ghana and Cote dÍvoire
He said: “They are determined to ensure that they have a two by three dual carriage way running from Lagos to Abidjan.
“We are launching that particular project.
“We have already launched the feasibility studies for that project and the economic study as well as the preliminary designs.
“Hopefully, when all that is ready, we shall be launching the construction stage.
“The five Heads of States have given us the marching order that they want construction work to start before the end of 2014.
“We are working assiduously to ensure that.”
Onolememen said that the Ministers of Works of the five countries had formed an inter-ministerial committee, of which the Chairman of ECOWAS, President Alhassan Quattara, appointed him (Onolememen) as chairman of the project’s steering committee.
On how much Nigeria was contributing to the project, the Minister said that “the issue of contribution does not arise because the project will not be funded directly by the government”.
He added: “We are trying to do it through a combination of multilateral funding, concessionary loan and public private partnership for those alignments that have the right number of traffic.”
The minister said, however, that Nigeria had already begun work on a part of the road, which is the Lagos-Badagry Road, which President Goodluck Jonathan had taken interest in.
He said: “We have intervened.
“There are long stretches of that road right from the border towards Nigeria that have completely been recovered and reclaimed.
“In fact, all these happened in the last five months of 2013.
“Beyond that, it is part of the Trans-West African Highway on which we are collaborating with the governments of Benin Republic, Togo, Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire.”