Senate may sue contractor over failed N23bn road three years after completion
Fresh indications have emerged suggesting that the Senate Committee on Works currently investigating the N23 billion failed Ibadan-Ilorin road project may sue the contractor in order to recover the amount spent on the shoddy job.
Chairman of the committee, Sen. Kabiru Gaya, made this known in an interview, saying the committee discovered that the road, which is in bad shape, was completed in 2015.
The Committee observed during a recent oversight function that the quality of work done on the road failed to match the total amount spent.
According to him, “For the road, which was said to have been completed three years ago to have gone bad, it meant the project was not properly carried out”.
While stressing that the committee would get to the root of the matter to ensure that the contractor and all those involved in the project were brought to book, Gaya .averred that “We were told that the contractor had finished his job and three years after spending N23 billion the road has failed.
“We were shocked at the development and we said the senate will not take this kind of behaviour or allow this act of corruption to continue.
“If not for corruption, there is no how a contractor will finish a road and it fails within three years.
“We will investigate this. We have written a letter to the contractor and we will do a special investigation to know who authorised payment for such a shoddy job and who even paid the retention.
“Whoever we find wanting, I assure you will be brought to book to serve as deterrent to others,” he said.
Senator Gaya recalled that his Committee had similar discovery when it visited the North-Central on oversight and noticed that a contractor messed up seriously.
According to him, “the contractor was even pouring asphalt on a rainy day.
“In fact, he was out of site for years and when he heard we were coming, he quickly went to site.
“We have dealt with the matter and now a better contractor has been mobilised there,” Gaya said.
He said the committee had so far inspected roads across 33 states of the federation and would visit the remaining states before the end of the year as part of efforts to make all road in Nigeria motorable all year round.
