The Federal Government on Wednesday said that plans were at the advanced stage to return toll gate on the federal highways.
The Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola disclosed this while briefing State House Correspondents after the Federal Executive Council, FEC, meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari at the Council Chamber, Presidential Villa Abuja.
Fashola, flanked by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed said there was no law that stopped the government from having toll gate on federal roads.
He said, “There is no reason why we can’t toll, there was a policy of the government to abolish tolls or as it were, dismantle toll plaza but there is no law that prohibits tolling in Nigeria today. We expect to return toll plazas, We have concluded their designs of what they will look like, what materials they will be rebuilt with, what new considerations must go into them.
“What we are looking at now and trying to conclude is how the bank end runs.” He said that the government was also considering to eliminate the payment of cash by introducing electronic mode of payment.
The Minister further disclosed that government needed to acquire more lands to expand the width of the toll gates as it proposed to have a ten-lane.
According to him, FEC also gave approval for the repairs and rehabilitation of two road contracts that were awarded by the previous administration of President Goodluck Jonathan but without being cash-backed from N30.3bn to N46bn.
The new cost was in consonance with the reality of economic rates, market price indices for roads inputs such as cement, iron rods, diesel, petrol and lubricant and the changes in prices between 2010 and now.
Fashola said, “The first one is Ibadan-Lagere-Ilesha Bypass 22km and the contract was awarded in 2010, no budgetary funding and so the rate has become obsolete.
“The contractor wants a new rate and that has necessitated the revision of the rate by N3.17bn. The old contract of N6.7bn has moved now to N9.8bn.
“There is also a Suleja-Lambata-Minna road. This is a 101km. It was awarded in two phases. The first phase was awarded in 2010 – 40km and then the second phase covering kilometre 40 to 101 was awarded in March 2015 but they used the 2010 rate.
So, the contractor is now at a point where he said those rates were unsustainable; he can’t continue and we have recommended again that the reverse rate be considered and the council approved them.
“It’s a revision by addition of N12.6bn. So the contract price moved from N23.6bn to N36.2bn.”
