Snail-Speed work on Calabar-Ita, Cross River State, is threatening the take off of the Odupkani industrial park, put together by the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB).
The industrial park, which is believed to have the capacity of leading the country to full industrialisation, is currently cut-off by almost un-motorable road network from Uyo end, in Akwa Ibom State. Report reaching us at Greenbarge Reporters online newspaper and hardcopy magazine, said that contractors have returned to site, clearing the road and fixing some bridges.
It was gathered that though work is ongoing but that with the return of the rainy season, not much might be done to meet up with the fast pace the industrial village is spriging up.
A team of online publishers, drawn from the Guild of Corporate Online Publishers (GOCOP) who were on a guided tour of the project, confirmed that the over 100 kilometres of the road which stretches from Calabar in Cross River State to Itu in Akwa-Ibom State has been neglected by successive governments for over 20 years.
A motorist, who pleaded anonymous, expressed regret that the road, which has attracted budgetary approvals for repairs by four successive Federal government authorities, has remained unattended to.
He said that the first budget to fix the road was passed during the former President Olusegun Obasanjo regime.
“But it was unattended to in spite of the budget.
“When nothing came out of the Obasanjo regime’s budget proposal, the former President Goodluck Jonathan administration came and also captured it in one of their annual budgets.
“This also did not achieve anything. This ritual moved to the President Muhammadu Buhari administration. “President Buhari included the road in two annual budgets during his first term in office between 2015 and 2019; but no work was done. “The same administration captured the road in the budgets of 2020, 2021, and 2023. This is 2023, you can see that the road is still a nightmare for motorists.”
He expressed pain that the road, which serves the economic needs of the people of both Akwa-Ibom and Cross River States, could pose a major threat to the NCDMD’s industrial park under construction as it is not likely that serious investors would take up any space there with the road as presently is.
The Park is a masterpiece that was well-thought out by the NCDMB to ramp up the manufacturing capacity of indigenous hands with the aim of kick-starting manufacturing of inputs for real industrialisation of Nigeria.
