The recent announcement by the Lagos State Government to fix the bad portions of the Ikorodu – Mile 12 – Ketu road to ease perennial traffic gridlock that residents of Ikorodu and other road users have been experiencing over the years is commendable.
More gratifying is the fact that government has gone beyond announcing plans to mobilizing a construction company, China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC) Limited, to site as confirmed by the Majority Leader of the Lagos State House of Assembly and the representative of the Ikorodu Constituency I, Hon. Sanai Agunbiade, who has been on the matter for a while.
The presence of CCECC workers on the road was also confirmed by some of the residents who plied the road during the week. They spoke with THE IMPACT via WhatsApp chat and phone calls.
This effort of the government is commendable as it is a very practical way of correcting people’s impression about failed promises by government and alleviating years of hardship and sorrow suffered by motorists and commuters who have been spending several hours on daily basis on the road to get to their various destinations in a journey that should have taken them less than 30 minutes.
We have witnessed occasions when residents had to be on this same road at odd hours like 2.00am and yet, were unable to make it to their respective homes on time. This may sound unbelievable but that is the true reality of situation on the road and only those who had stuck in a gridlock on the road will know better.
The efforts of Hon. Agunbiade to ensure that the State government, under the leadership of Mr Akinwunmi Ambode, attended to this road did not yield any positive result. But it is a thing of joy that the resilience of the four term lawmaker to ensure that the road is rehabilitated has finally received the attention of the Mr Babajide Sanwo – Olu/Dr Obafemi Hamzat led administration.
The lawmaker has consistently been on the neck of the current administration, especially the Governor, his Deputy and the Special Adviser on Works, on the need to fix the road to lessen the hardship that commuters face on daily basis. Some of the interventions, correspondences and engagements by the lawmaker are very well known to THE IMPACT.
This is without prejudice to efforts of other elected and appointed representatives.
But beyond contracting one of the giant construction firms with needed capacity to fix the road in record time and do a quality job, the government needs to do much more than that, especially if its effort in fixing the road would be well appreciated.
This is the area residents of Ikorodu Division and other road users are expecting the representation capacity of Hon. Agunbiade and his counterpart in ikorodu Constituency II, Hon. Nuruden Solaja, to be brought to bear fully on the executive arm.
The only permanent solution to the heavy traffic on the road is for the state commodity market popularly known and called Mile 12 market, to be moved permanently.
The burden of this task falls more on Hon. Agunbiade, being the representative of Ikorodu who has been at the forefront of the effort to address problems causing the perennial traffic gridlock which inflicts hardship on the people every day as well as being the Majority Leader of the state who plies the road every day to his Office in Alausa, lkeja, and experienced same hardship and discomfort like other commuters and also being the former Chairman, House Committee on Commerce and Industry, the committee saddled with the oversight function on Mile 12 market.
It is also important that his counterpart in Ikorodu Constituency II, Hon. Nurudeeen Solaja, should add his voice to the discourse and deploy his representation capacity towards finding a permanent solution to the traffic problem on the Ikorodu – Mile 12 – Ketu road.
In addition, the representative of the Ikorodu Federal Constituency, Hon. Babajimi Benson, and the Senator representing the Lagos East Senatorial District, Senator Adebayo Osinowo, also need to intervene in finding permanent solution to this perennial traffic problem.
It is quite sad that the current government is not considering the relocation of the Mile 12 market despite the fact that the immediate past administration started the movement of the market to a permanent site in Imota area of Ikorodu division.
In actual fact, the state government, during the last administration, has committed enormous tax payers’ money in developing the new site for the market.
Why is it that policy to relocate the market to a new site not being followed by the current administration? Is the present administration discontinuing that policy? Does the resolution of the Lagos State House of Assembly in this regard has no force of law/duty on the executive anymore? These and many more need to be explained to the residents/electorates urgently.
Conclusively, while it is commendable that the state government is currently embarking on the rehabilitation of the Ikorodu – Mile 12 – Ketu road to resolve the perennial traffic situation that is causing loss in man hours and untoward hardship for the road users, it is important that the Sanwo-Olu’s government continue with the policy aimed at permanently resolving the traffic situation by seeing to the completion of the relocation of the Mile 12 market to the site where millions of taxpayers’ money has been sunk constructing structure. This, certainly, is the only permanent solution to the persistent traffic logjam that would be in tandem with the Mega City status that government is pursuing and would also makes life more abundant and easy for residents of Ikorodu Division and other users of the most popular road in the Centre of Excellence.
