TWO weeks after the concession of the Lagos/Ibadan
Expressway was cancelled by the Federal Government, Bi-Courtney Highway
Services Limited (BCHSL) yesterday accused Works Minister, Mike Onolemenmen,
and the Minister of State, Alhaji Bashir Yuguda, of being responsible for the
three-year delay of the project.
The Federal Government terminated the contract on November 19 and announced that Julius Berger and Reynolds Construction Company (RCC) would handle the reconstruction of the road built in 1978.
In an advertorial yesterday, BCHSL blamed the two ministers for variously interfering to frustrate the execution of the concession project.
It stated categorically that: “the Ministry of Works initially inadvertently delayed the works, due to its weak technical capacity, and demonstrably, maliciously delayed the project under Arc. Mike Onolemenmen and Alhaji Barshir Yuguda”, a situation the company felt Nigerians must know to put an end to what it described as “ triumph of mediocrity”.
Chronicling the genesis of the concession saga, Bi-Courtney stated that the concession was actually approved in May 2009, while the site was delivered in September of the same year.
On December 9 of the same year, pre-conception formalities were concluded and an independent engineer was approved.
It said inception report, interim report, draft final report and final report submitted to the ministry, which ordinarily should have taken about four months, took the ministry 18 months, between September, 2009 to May, 2011 to work on, saying, “the design process was expected to be completed in four months, the ministry delayed it for 18 months.
“Approval of design and authority to commence actual construction was obtained on 10 May, 2011 and international partners observed the need to amend the agreement to meet international standard in August, 2011 was communicated to the ministry,” it stated.
According to Bi-Courtney, “in March 2012, project due diligence was completed in line with international best practices, while in April of the same year, the report was presented to the FMW and ICRC and got the FMW and ICRC commendation on work done.
However, “between August, 2011 and April 2012, no response was received from the ministry. During this period, we were strongly advised by the ministry not to do any serious works on the road other than palliatives. But in May 2012, the process of amendment of the agreement commenced”
July 2012 came a new twist by the introduction of a transaction adviser “appointed by Federal Ministry of Works, a move we foresaw as introducing new rules, which are designed to frustrate the contract and we condemned it, and in the same month, the renegotiation road map was agreed between BCHS and FMW”.
In August 2012, when work was about to start, a presidential directive came that Bi-Courtney should revert to the old agreement.
However, major works commenced through Borini Prono from September 23, 2012 “and we were commended by the Ministry of Works of the quality and pace of work aired by TV stations, namely, Channels on 12th November, 2012 and NTA on 13th november, 2012. We were to hear the alleged cancellation of the concession on 19th November, 2012.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the concession operated for three years. Two years and 10 months delay is directly attributable to the Ministry of Works”.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government yesterday said there was no going back on the re-introduction and construction of toll gates on Lagos-Ibadan Expressway to guarantee its regular maintenance and sustainability.
Not only that, the government also expressed its readiness to go ahead with its plan for the Public Private Partnership policy of sustaining all the existing infrastructures nationwide.
Onolemenmen made this known to reporters while on tour of North/South road from Lagos-Ibadan Expressway linking Ibadan-Oyo-Ogbomoso-Ilorin road extending to Jebba, Mokwa, Kaduna, Kano and other Northern states.
Onolemenmen, who addressed reporters shortly after touring 52km Oyo-Ogbomoso road which is the section 11 of Ibadan-Ilorin road being handled by Reynolds Construction Company (RCC) and expected to be completed by December, 2013, said toll gates would be introduced on Lagos-Ibadan road as soon as the on-going reconstruction and expansion works are completed by both the RCC and Julius Berger.
The move to reintroduce toll gates on highways nationwide, according to him, was basically to have funds to "sustain and maintain this road so that it would not go back to the sorry state we met it and similar others across the federation".
He said when the roads being inspected are fully completed, people can now drive freely from Lagos to the Northern part of Nigeria.
On the termination of contract for Lagos-Ibadan road earlier concessioned to Bi-Courtney, the minister said the company was not doing well on it as it failed to meet up with the financial involvement needed to fix the road in record time, adding that, the government has the right to terminate it just as he drew inference from similar road projects that were terminated in India recently.
"I assure you that by the first quarter of next year, you will see a major difference on Lagos-Ibadan Expressway."
The site engineer of RCC, Yehoda Leve, who conducted the minister and his team round the Oyo-Ogbomoso section of the road, assured that the road would be delivered as scheduled.
The Federal Government terminated the contract on November 19 and announced that Julius Berger and Reynolds Construction Company (RCC) would handle the reconstruction of the road built in 1978.
In an advertorial yesterday, BCHSL blamed the two ministers for variously interfering to frustrate the execution of the concession project.
It stated categorically that: “the Ministry of Works initially inadvertently delayed the works, due to its weak technical capacity, and demonstrably, maliciously delayed the project under Arc. Mike Onolemenmen and Alhaji Barshir Yuguda”, a situation the company felt Nigerians must know to put an end to what it described as “ triumph of mediocrity”.
Chronicling the genesis of the concession saga, Bi-Courtney stated that the concession was actually approved in May 2009, while the site was delivered in September of the same year.
On December 9 of the same year, pre-conception formalities were concluded and an independent engineer was approved.
It said inception report, interim report, draft final report and final report submitted to the ministry, which ordinarily should have taken about four months, took the ministry 18 months, between September, 2009 to May, 2011 to work on, saying, “the design process was expected to be completed in four months, the ministry delayed it for 18 months.
“Approval of design and authority to commence actual construction was obtained on 10 May, 2011 and international partners observed the need to amend the agreement to meet international standard in August, 2011 was communicated to the ministry,” it stated.
According to Bi-Courtney, “in March 2012, project due diligence was completed in line with international best practices, while in April of the same year, the report was presented to the FMW and ICRC and got the FMW and ICRC commendation on work done.
However, “between August, 2011 and April 2012, no response was received from the ministry. During this period, we were strongly advised by the ministry not to do any serious works on the road other than palliatives. But in May 2012, the process of amendment of the agreement commenced”
July 2012 came a new twist by the introduction of a transaction adviser “appointed by Federal Ministry of Works, a move we foresaw as introducing new rules, which are designed to frustrate the contract and we condemned it, and in the same month, the renegotiation road map was agreed between BCHS and FMW”.
In August 2012, when work was about to start, a presidential directive came that Bi-Courtney should revert to the old agreement.
However, major works commenced through Borini Prono from September 23, 2012 “and we were commended by the Ministry of Works of the quality and pace of work aired by TV stations, namely, Channels on 12th November, 2012 and NTA on 13th november, 2012. We were to hear the alleged cancellation of the concession on 19th November, 2012.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the concession operated for three years. Two years and 10 months delay is directly attributable to the Ministry of Works”.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government yesterday said there was no going back on the re-introduction and construction of toll gates on Lagos-Ibadan Expressway to guarantee its regular maintenance and sustainability.
Not only that, the government also expressed its readiness to go ahead with its plan for the Public Private Partnership policy of sustaining all the existing infrastructures nationwide.
Onolemenmen made this known to reporters while on tour of North/South road from Lagos-Ibadan Expressway linking Ibadan-Oyo-Ogbomoso-Ilorin road extending to Jebba, Mokwa, Kaduna, Kano and other Northern states.
Onolemenmen, who addressed reporters shortly after touring 52km Oyo-Ogbomoso road which is the section 11 of Ibadan-Ilorin road being handled by Reynolds Construction Company (RCC) and expected to be completed by December, 2013, said toll gates would be introduced on Lagos-Ibadan road as soon as the on-going reconstruction and expansion works are completed by both the RCC and Julius Berger.
The move to reintroduce toll gates on highways nationwide, according to him, was basically to have funds to "sustain and maintain this road so that it would not go back to the sorry state we met it and similar others across the federation".
He said when the roads being inspected are fully completed, people can now drive freely from Lagos to the Northern part of Nigeria.
On the termination of contract for Lagos-Ibadan road earlier concessioned to Bi-Courtney, the minister said the company was not doing well on it as it failed to meet up with the financial involvement needed to fix the road in record time, adding that, the government has the right to terminate it just as he drew inference from similar road projects that were terminated in India recently.
"I assure you that by the first quarter of next year, you will see a major difference on Lagos-Ibadan Expressway."
The site engineer of RCC, Yehoda Leve, who conducted the minister and his team round the Oyo-Ogbomoso section of the road, assured that the road would be delivered as scheduled.
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