Dangote Industries Plc, Lafarge Africa Plc; Unilever Nigeria Plc; Flour Mills of Nigeria Plc; Nigeria LNG Limited and China Road and Bridge Corporation Nigeria Limited are set to execute 19 federal road projects across 11 states in Nigeria.
The deal is the product of the Executive Order 007 2019 signed by President Muhammadu Buhari at the weekend to urgently assist in solving the infrastructure nightmare in the country.
he Minister of Finance, Mrs Zainab Ahmed, who made the disclosure via her Spokesman, Ella Abechi yesterday, said she will chair a 13-man Scheme’s Management Committee of various road and bridge projects under the pilot scheme.
According to her, the road project totals 794.4km and carefully spread across the six geo-political Zones.
They are; Construction of Ashaka-Bajoga highway in Gombe State; reconstruction of Dikwa-Gambaru Ngala road in Borno State; reconstruction of Bama-Banki road in Borno State;
Rehabilitation of Sharada road in Kano State; rehabilitation of Nnamdi Azikiwe Expressway/Bypass in Kaduna State; reconstruction of Birnin Gwari expressway in Kaduna State; reconstruction of Birnin Gwari – Dansadau Road in Kaduna State; reconstruction of Makurdi-Yandev-Gboko road in Benue State; reconstruction of Zone Roundabout-House of Assembly road in Benue State.
Others are reconstruction of Obajana-Kabba road in Kogi State; reconstruction of Ekuku-Idoma-Obehira road in Kogi State; construction of Adavi Eba-Ikuehi-Obeiba-Obokore Road in Kogi State; rehabilitation of Lokoja-Ganaja road in Kogi State; Ofeme community road network and bridges in
Abia State; rehabilitation of Obele-Ilaro-Papalanto-Shagamu Road in Ogun State; reconstruction of Sokoto road in Ogun State; reconstruction of Apapa-Oshodi-Oworonshoki-Ojota road in Lagos State; construction of Bodo-Bonny road & bridges across Opobo Channel in Rivers State; and rehabilitation of Benin City – Asaba road in Edo State.
The Minister hinted that the government was actively soliciting for more serious proposals from interested investors, State governments and other stakeholders who may wish to take advantage of this scheme to partner with the Federal Government in investing in roads.
The Minister said: “Our intention is for there to be at least one significant eligible road project underway in every state of the federation within the first year of the operation of this scheme.”
Ahmed noted that once approved, the eligible road projects will be published in an official gazette, and modalities would be agreed upon with the investors to accelerate the implementation of these projects, the verification of eligible project costs, as well as the issuance of tax credit certificates to the Investors.
The Minister charged her team to develop and deliver innovative ways of leveraging private finance through Public Private Partnerships to address the country’s infrastructure deficit.
She added that Executive Order 007 of 2019 on the Road Infrastructure Development and Refurbishment Investment Tax Credit Scheme was the outcome of her team’s innovative efforts that thrust on deploying new techniques to develop critical road infrastructure across the country.
