On Wednesday, the Federal Executive Council (FEC) approved N11.1 billion for the reconstruction of an intra-city road in Lagos State.
Babatunde Fashola, Minister of Works and Housing, divulged this while briefing State House Correspondents at the end of the cabinet meeting by President Muhammadu Buhari.
He said: “The council approved two memoranda presented by the ministry. The first was a contract for the reconstruction of the Mushin-NNPC-Apapa-Oshodi road, which is the road that goes through Isolo to Ejigbo, at the sum of N11, 166,270,197.85 with a completion period of 20 months.”
The Minister also said the council had approved reimbursing Kebbi and Taraba State governments N9.1 billion for the construction of federal roads.
According to Fashola, “This follows the report and recommendation of a council committee set up by the President in order to respond to demands by state governments for refunds on an intervention made previously before this administration on federal roads.
“The President subsequently issued the directive that there should be no more intervention by states on federal roads, but there were some that had been done before the life of this administration. So there were three states, Kebbi, Yobe and Taraba. I think on the 22nd of June, I reported that the claims for Yobe for N18.663 billion were approved.
“That left for those of Kebbi and Taraba states. So today the council approved N6.706 billion for Kebbi state and N2.470 billion for Taraba state. He concluded by saying: “An interesting thing to note about these reforms is that they relate to debts and obligations incurred by the previous administration before the life of this administration. So this is also part of the national debt. So the process of payment requires the Ministry of Finance subsequent to this approval now, to go to the National Assembly, to get approval to raise debt to secure payment to the States.”
