INVESTIGATION… Ten years after, communities count losses as AfDB, Cross River govt abandon road project

Ten years after the Cross River State government and African Development Bank (AFDB) jointly awarded the Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road for construction under the Cross River Rural Access and Mobility Project (CR-RAMP), it remains abandoned, while the supposed beneficiaries continue to lament deaths, loss of livelihoods and increasing poverty due to the deplorable state of the road. SUNDAY ELOM reports.

 

The road cuts across North and South Ukelle in Yala Local Government Area (LGA), Cross River State. The 49 minutes journey on the 30.3 km road from Yahe Junction, Yahe Township to Wanikade in North Ukelle is a hellish experience. Not just because the fare is outrageous, but due to the attendant ill health that communities along the corridor of the abandoned road are exposed to.

The potholes concealed in thick layers of dust make travelling on the road stressful and risky as vehicles fall into them unknowingly. This causes accidents and often leads to breakdown of vehicles.

Awarded in 2011 but abandoned

The contract for the Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road was first advertised in December 2010 and awarded on May 18, 2011 under the Cross River Rural Access and Mobility Project (CR-RAMP) to Emamed Nigeria Limited (ENL) at the sum of N792,863,414.06 by the African Development Bank Group. The project, pegged at 37.5km, was designed to be implemented through a special arrangement by the State Project Implementation Unit (SPIU) under the supervision of the Cross River State Ministry of Works.

Weeks after the contractor moved to site and tarred less than 5km of the 37.5km road, work ceased. Since then, the project has remained abandoned and communal efforts to get the contractor to return to site have proved abortive.

Evidence from worn out tarmacs observed by this newspaper showed that Emamed Nigeria Limited (ENL) only constructed the road from Yahe to Ebo, a neighbouring community.

Francis Usili, a resident of Wanikade noted that Emamed Nigeria Limited (ENL) did not do much work on the project.

“They only succeeded in extending the culverts to Ebo. They didn’t even get to Wanokom. Nobody knows what happened but all of a sudden, the contractor packed and left the site,” he said.

When contacted on phone, a staff of ENL who identified himself as Mr. Adeyemi Adejo Gabriel said the project was abandoned “because the state government refused to pay.”

Adejo declined to give additional details about the contract.

“If you want to know more about it, you should go to the ministry. There is a Ministry of Works in Cross River State and whatever story they tell you is okay,” he said.

Meanwhile, in February 2013, the Cross River State Project Coordinator, Charles Okongoh, an engineer, disclosed that the state had committed N20.31 billion to the implementation of the CR-RAMP. Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road is among the roads he claimed were ongoing with the implementation deadline pegged at June 2013.

However, Okongoh did not give any breakdown of the N20.31 billion he claimed the state government had spent on the CR-RAMP, hence, it is not clear how much was committed to the Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road.

Two months later Okongoh beat a retreat claiming that the June deadline for completion of projects under the CR-RAMP would not be feasible due to excessive rainfall and the topography of most project areas. Since then, there have been no reasons from the Cross River State government for abandoning the road.

The CR-RAMP is a pro-poor project meant to address the challenges of rural roads in the state jointly financed by the African Development Bank (AFDB) and the Cross River State government with each accounting for 34.52 and 65.48  per cent of the total cost of civil works respectively.

Emamed Nigeria Limited was paid in full

Contrary to the claim by the staff of the Emamed Nigeria Limited, Adeyemi Gabriel, that the ENL abandoned Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road project because government refused to pay, documents and details obtained from the African Development Bank Group revealed that it released the complete contract amount, N792,863,414.06 to the contractor.

A sum of N777,205,715.70 was first allocated for the project; however, financial review and amendment was done and the sum of N15,657,698.36 was added to the allocated funds, bringing the total contract funds to N792,863,414.06. The AFDB released the last tranche, N80,000,000 of the contract funds to Emamed Nigeria Limited on April 8, 2016.

“Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road was part of Lot 8, CR-RAMP/lot 8/2010/PRO/CW/vol.1, which included 2 other roads making a total length of 63.55km (37.5 km +24.85km +1.2km),” an official of the AFDB said.

The bank also confirmed that funds were released directly to the contractor based on monthly or periodic certificates for works completed and validated by the supervision consultants before submission to the Bank.

According to the bank, a total of 406.7km, equivalent to 85% of a total planned length of 477.5 km of CR-RAMP, were completed to final pavement level before the project was closed in 2016.

However, it is contradicting how AFDB certified and paid Emamed Nigeria Limited in full for an abandoned project. Furthermore, the abandoned 37.5km Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road is the evidence to disprove AFDB’s claim that 406.7km of the total 477.5km of CR-RAMP were completed.

The fact that Emamed Nigeria Limited received full payment for the project therefore means that AFDB included the abandoned Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road project in its 85% completed projects.

Emamed Nigeria Limited is a Consulting Organization in Civil Engineering, Programme & Resource Management, Water & Sanitation. It was founded and registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) as a limited liability company on June 22, 1994 with registration No. RC-249184. Its registered address is at 33, Ada George Road, Off AGIP Road, Rumueme, Obio/Akpor, Port Harcourt, Rivers State. Its status details on CAC show that the company is currently inactive. Gabriel is its Account Manager while Olanubi Olaniyi is the Senior Project Manager.

Governor Ayade re-awards the project to another contractor in 2017

Despite countless assurances that the road would be constructed, communities along the route are left with tales of unending groundbreaking ceremonies while they continue to experience nightmares on the road.

In 2017, residents of Ezekwe community, an agrarian settlement in Yala Local Government Area, thought a new dawn had arrived when Governor Ben Ayade re-awarded Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road to Sydney Construction Nigeria Limited at the sum of N3.8 billion.

During the official signing of the contract at the Government House in Calabar, the Commissioner for Works, Engr. Dane Osim-Asu, told journalists that due to limited funds, the project “was not a direct contract per se”, but “a direct labour job.” He added that the state government only contracted Sydney Construction Nigeria Limited as a service provider to ensure that the works ministry did the job with direct labour.

The commissioner added that Sydney Construction Nigeria Limited was already on ground handling some of the state’s major projects covering five local government areas (LGAs), therefore, they did not require any form of mobilization; rather they were to move to site.

However, unlike Emamed Nigeria Limited, which constructed a few kilometres before abandoning the project, Sydney Construction Nigeria Limited never started work on the road.

Chief Denis Ugede, the clan head of Wanokom community, said that almost every year, government officials promise that the road would be constructed but they have never witnessed contractors mobilised to site.

Residents of communities along the Cross River–Benue border road said they have become weary of government’s promises on the road.

Peter Okpako lives in Wanikade. He also had high hopes for the project in 2018 during a groundbreaking ceremony which never resulted in the execution of the project.

“We have had a series of groundbreaking ceremonies on that road but yet, the road is nothing to write home about.”

Legislative interventions failed

Following the abandonment of the project by Sydney Construction Nigeria Limited, affected communities continued to cry for help on the road. In response to their cries, a member representing Yala II State Constituency, Hon. Cynthia Nkasi, moved a motion on the deplorable state of the road and its attendant impact on the people during one of the State House of Assembly’s plenaries in July 2019.

Reacting to Hon. Nkasi’s motion, the House ordered Sydney Construction Nigeria Limited to return to site, even though the contractor had never commenced work since it signed the contract agreement in 2017. The contractor neither acknowledged nor obeyed the House order.

When Hon. Nkasi was contacted on the phone to find out why the project still remained abandoned and why the contractor did not obey the House’s order, she had no answer..

“Well, I don’t know why the contractor abandoned the project. I can’t give any reason why the road was abandoned. My duty as a legislator is to draw the attention of the government to it, which I have done, she said.

“The work I know is under Sydney Construction Nigeria Limited and Sydney works is supervised by the Ministry of Works. So, our resolution at the House goes to the ministry of works who should call the contractors.”

Communities count their losses

The deplorable state of Yahe-Wanokom-Wanikade-Benue border road has become a perpetual source of sorrow to residents of the affected communities including Ebo, Okpodon, Ezekwe, Igede, Wanokom, Wanikade, and Wanehim. Smallholder farmers and traders in these communities say the road has affected their livelihoods.

They find it almost impossible to take their farm produce and goods to markets in neighbouring communities; while access to markets outside the state, including the neighbouring Benue and Ebonyi states, especially in the rainy season is a daydream for them.

In the rainy season, the road becomes completely non-motorable. Many parts of the road have been cut off by gully erosion, making it difficult for vehicles to ply the route even in the dry season. While trying to maneuver the road, motorists are often stuck in potholes, the majority of which have become deep like pits.

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Eric Ujiji is a lorry driver who regularly plies the Yahe-Wanokom-Benue border route. Narrating his ordeal during his trips to the communities, Eric said he spends a minimum of N20,000 repairing his truck each time it develops faults after plying the road.

“For instance, I’m changing a broken spring at N12,000; two new hangers at N2,000 per one and then workmanship N4,000, making everything N20,000, which is the lowest I often spend.”

Eric who said he only drives through the road to markets in the communities in the rainy season with his tipper truck laments how miscreants block the road and extort truck drivers N1,000 to N1,500 every market day.