Abuja satellite roads terrible, impassable, residents lament

The appropriate agency said it was short of funds.

Some residents of satellite towns in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, on Tuesday decried the deplorable state of some roads in the towns.

While some complained of lack of maintenance of the roads, others decried the slow pace of work in on-going road projects.

They said the situation makes movement difficult for the residents even as the rainy season sets in.

A resident of Kuje, Yusuf Yakub, said that many roads in the area are not motorable.

“If you drive round Kuje, you will observe that most of the roads are very bad and we don’t know what plans the government has for the roads in 2014.

“The construction of dual road on the Kuje-Gwagwalada route has been on for some time but they are yet to complete it and we don’t know when it will be completed.

“The Kuje Area Council appears not to be very functional and we expect the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) to intervene,” he said.

Harrison Chukwuma, who resides at Kubwa, complained that the inner streets in Kubwa were not maintained.

“Most of the roads in Kubwa have been tarred but the inner streets are not tarred. This makes them impassable, particularly during rainy seasons,” he said.
He advised Satellite Towns Development Agency, STDA, of the FCTA to urgently address the situation.

A resident of Jikwoyi, Michael Udeora, also complained of bad roads in Jikwoyi, and advised the STDA to step into the situation.

“Most of the inner roads in Karu and Jikwoyi are in a bad state. The government should repair them as a matter of priority,” he said.

The Director of STDA, Tukur Bakori, said that the agency had been forced to prioritise its projects due to paucity of funds.

“We have decided to prioritise and complete existing projects as fast as possible. For now, we don’t have any new projects. That will make us to effectively manage our resources.

“Some of our priority projects include the Karshi-Apo road, which will check traffic logjam in the Nyanya-Mararaba axis, and the Kuje-Gwagwalada road,” he said.

Mr. Bakori said that the benefits of such prioritisation would manifest in 2014 when the urban renewal projects in the satellite towns would have been completed.
(NAN)