Lagos-Ibadan Expressway now for completion in 2018

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The redesigned Lagos-Ibadan Expressway earlier scheduled to be delivered in July 2017, now has 2018 as its new completion date, the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, The Infrastructure Bank Plc, Mr. Adekunle Oyinloye, has said.

He said if talks between the Federal Government and private sector participants in the project went well, full work would commence on the highway very soon.

Oyinloye, who spoke at a news conference in Lagos, said the Federal Government was concerned about the pains of Nigerians on the road.

He, however, said the delay in the commencement of the full work had to do with the need to ensure a world-class highway was delivered to the country.

Giving details of the new design of the road, Oyinloye said, “These new features are being worked on now. What the government wanted to do was just to rehabilitate and reconstruct. But the subsequent intention is that if the road is going to be used as an asset to repay, if it is going to be sustained for a long time, there has to be additional features to it.

“That is the thinking of the government and its partners. Right now, there is only the Sagamu Interchange. Then the question is how do you take traffic off the highway when people are going to the Redemption Camp? So, those additional features are coming into the earlier design, which may alter the initial cost.”

He further said, “All that is necessary is to take traffic off the highway, whether people are going to the Redemption Camp or the NASFAT is doing its prayer on the road, or the Mountain of Fire is having a programme. The funding is being put together such that nothing stops when we start.

“The challenge of redesigning must be done now because we don’t want the engineers to have gone far before you realise that there is a need for an overhead bridge here or there. The redesigning is going on now and once it is concluded, the additional cost will be determined.”

Source: Punch