Strong indications emerged last week that less than six months after it was announced that the ambitious dredging of lower River Niger was nearing completion, the Lokoja, Kogi state lot may have been abandoned with the contractors moving from site.
Industry sources told our correspondent last week that the N36bn (or £140m, $233m) project which is expected to remove silt from hundreds of miles of the river; arguably Africa’s third-longest.
Strong indications emerged last week that less than six months after it was announced that the ambitious dredging of lower River Niger was nearing completion, the Lokoja, Kogi state lot may have been abandoned with the contractors moving from site.
Industry sources told our correspondent last week that the N36bn (or £140m, $233m) project which is expected to remove silt from hundreds of miles of the river; arguably Africa’s third-longest.
About 572km of strategic lower Niger is expected to be dredged – from Baro in Niger state through Warri to Bayelsa in the Niger Delta.
Shipping Position Weekly confirmed that while some efforts have been recorded between lots one and two and between lots four, but the Lokoja axis has not experienced significant dredging.
Our correspondent who visited the lot at Lokoja last week could not sight the contractors, neither was any dredging activity in progress.
It was also confirmed that even though the Onitsha river port; which is a beneficiary of the Niger River dredging is almost ready for completion, the same cannot be said of Lokoja river port.
“The picture in Onitsha is not the same along the 572 kilometre stretch, no other significant improvement, at least here in Lokoja”, a resident of Lokoja told our correspondent last week.
Shipping Position Weekly recalls that the immediate past minister of transport, Alhaji Ibrahim Isah Bio had towards the tail end of his tenure assured that the project was nearing completion.
After a visit to “The dredging of the lower River Niger project, which was flagged off last year, is progressing according to schedule. It is almost 60 per cent completed and has not been suspended in any form and all contactors are on site.
“About 572 kilometres of the lower River Niger will be dredged, passing through 152 communities spread across eight states of Kogi, Niger, Anambra, Imo, Delta, Rivers, Edo and Bayelsa”, he had said.
According to him, the progress so far made on the 572-kilometre project include Warri to Bifurcation, which has recorded a 50 per cent execution rate; Birfucation to Onitsha, 80 per cent; Onitsha to Ida 30 per cent; Idah to Jamata 90 per cent and Jamata to Baro; 50 per cent.
But, industry sources explained last week that the show in Onitsha was political and that it was meant to woo eastern voters and that apart from Onitsha, no other part of the 572 kilometre stretch can be used to derive political gains.
However, the chairman, of community relations committee for the dredging project, Otunba Kunle Folarin defended the project saying that it was on course and that there was no truth in the allegation that the Lokoja lot has been abandoned.
“The Onitsha river port has just been commissioned, so how can anyone say that the dredging has been abandoned or that we have stopped work at Lokoja, it’s not true”, he maintained.
He however confirmed that about four of the five lots ahve been completed owing to variances in the contract for one lot.
When confronted with the allegation that the dredging in Lokoja was poorly done and that the draught is not more than two feet in some areas along the Lokoja lot, he explained that dredging is not like road construction where the whole stretch is seen to be motorable and that what some people see as shallow are actually areas that will not be navigable to ships. “The dredging is only to create a free lane where navigation will pass through and not the whole of River Niger”, he stressed.
Discussion about this post