The Akwa Ibom State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) on Sunday called on the Federal Government to urgently dualise Calabar-Itu highway, as the project had been captured in the 2016 budget.
The party made the call on the heels of a directive by the acting Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, Ibim Semenitari, that work should commence on the road, cut into two by flood.
Several stretches of the road have become a nightmare for motorists as they have had to spend several days trying to navigate through terrible spots on the road.
The Akwa Ibom APC, in a statement signed by its chairman, Dr. Amadu Atai and addressed to the Minister of Transport, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, said the road has become impassable following more than 16 years of total neglect of the thoroughfare.
According to Atai, travelling along the Odukpani-Itu-Ikot Ekpene stretch of the road is now a tortuous and nightmarish experience for Nigerians, adding that the road had become a veritable death trap with many people losing their lives to accidents on the road.
The statement urged the government to take some critical interim and palliative measures by mending the extremely bad sections of the road to ease the travails of commuters, pending the completion of the dualisation of that axis.
“Honourable minister, please permit us to respectfully call your attention to the current deplorable state of an axis of the federal highway. Arising from more than 16 years of total neglect of this road, it is presently in its most pitiable and dilapidated condition.
“Because of this condition, travelling along the Odukpani-Itu-Ikot Ekpene stretch of the road is now a tortuous and nightmarish experience for our people. Indeed, it is a veritable death trap as several innocent lives have been lost to accidents at fatal spots along this road”, the statement added.
