Engineer Seyi Makinde’s government in Oyo State through its Commissioner for Works, Public Infrastructure and Transport, Prof. Daud Shangodoyin, on Monday, declared that the present administration in the state is determined to deliver quality infrastructure projects that will stand the test of time.
The Commissioner made this disclosure when he embarked on an inspection tour of the Ajia-Airport Road with spur to Amuloko with the Quality Assurance Team of the Ministry and site engineers of the Peculiar Ultimate Concerns.
A statement by the Special Assistant (Print Media) to Governor Makinde, Moses Alao, indicated that the Commissioner and his team inspected a spot of the road on Odeyale-Amuloko axis of the road, to which a resident had called the government’s attention.
He declared that the state government and the contractors had noticed the challenge on the spot along the 2.9 kilometre Ajia-Amuloko axis since October 2021, and had since instructed the contractors to address it.
He maintained that the spot is a valley and that whenever it rains, the convergence of water is always too much and that water is being retained, stating that the state has had to adjust the design to accommodate the water.
He added that the contractor had been directed to increase the stone base on that axis of the road from 100mm to 120mm and that this was in addition to increasing the hard rock base of the project, among other improvements.
The Commissioner stated that the contractor will also put a binding course in place after the stone base had been increased, noting that the fears expressed by the resident had since been taken care of before the alarm was raised.
The Commissioner equally stated that contrary to fears that the road might be handed over with challenges, the section of the road is only about 56 per cent completed and that residents should rest assured that the government will deliver a quality project.
He said: “We are here to inspect the 21 kilometres Ajia-Airport road with a spur to Amuloko following a complaint by a resident. The person advised us to come and check what they are doing.
“Usually, we do inspections three times a week on all our projects but this is a special case because, for the last three hours, I have been here to inspect what we are doing.
“We are here on the 2.9km from the junction of Ajia to Amuloko. The place we are working on has what we can call a rise or high-level base, which is about 250 metres from the Odeyale mosque to the church section here.
“Now, what we found out in the design is that the water level is high. So, we had to increase the hard rock base. We actually included the water base filter, which is to filter part of the water level. Now, we have increased the stone base. Our specification for this road is 100mm stone base. But for this section, we have increased it to 120mm so as to accommodate the water level.
“After the stone base, we will put the binding course. For the road that we are here now, the completion rate is 56 per cent.
“Nobody has told any resident that we have completed this road. It is an ongoing project, which the quality assurance team of the Ministry of Public Works and Transport including the engineers and our independent advisory team have been here to check, and we are satisfied with what they are doing. As a matter of fact, we have pictures of what they have done.
“In the light of this, I would like to advise members of the public that we are a listening and pro-active government but people should not do politics with things that they don’t really understand.”
Packaged by Kunle Gazali
