Some road users in Lagos, on Wednesday, appealed to the Federal Government to urgently fix the failed portions around Mushin Olosha sections of Agege Motor Road causing gridlock and hardship.
The road users made the appeal in separate interviews in Lagos.
A large deep flooded potholes were on two sections of the Sango Ota-bound carriageway around Olosha, making it difficult for vehicles to navigate.
Street urchins, popularly called ‘area boys’ now lurked around the bad portions to assist the drivers of vehicles that got stuck in any of the flooded craters for fees.
A tricycle operator plying Mushin/Idi-Oro axis, Ade Adesanya, said the bad portions had become a nightmare for the operators who daily risk accidents on the bad portions.
Adesanya said some tricycles had, on several occasions, upturned on the bad portions, causing severe injuries to passengers.
Mr Solomon Udeh, a musical instruments and equipment dealer at Mushin, said the bad road usually caused heavy gridlock during peak periods.
He said: “I can count up to five containers that have fallen at this spot of Olosha bus stop in Mushin.”
Udeh said because his shop was near one of the bad portions, he usually witnessed the hardship being faced by road users and begged for government’s urgent intervention.
“We need government to help us because it is very terrible.
“In the evening, this place is usually a no-go area, as everywhere will be blocked. So, we need government’s urgent help,” he said.
A banker, Mrs Josephine Katung, appealed to government to carry out some palliatives on the road to reduce people’s suffering.
Katung said she had been at the mercy of area boys twice when her car wheels got trapped in one of the craters.
“This road has been like this for over three weeks. Why are government agencies turning a blind eye? Potholes should be fixed when they are emerging, I mean, it doesn’t have to be this bad.
“This is not good for business; the man-hours lost every day is what government must look at,” she said.
Katung appealed to the federal government to urgently fix the bad portions to reduce hours wasted on the highway on daily basis.
In his reaction, a Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA) official blamed the constant degeneration of the road on drain stuffing and channelization of some sewage to the highway.
Mr Olisa Emeter, who is FERMA’s Federal Roads Maintenance Engineer (FRME) in charge of Lagos II West, told NAN that constant flooding of the highway caused the continued degeneration of the road.
Emeter said that the agency had fixed the degenerated portions several times but they kept failing because of the water that usually damaged the asphalt.
He said that the agency’s drain evacuation interventions were being made insignificant because of the drain stuffing habits of residents, making water to destroy the road.
He appealed to residents to desist from drain stuffing so as to curb flooding and quick degeneration of the roads.
“We will see how to move out the water causing the damage.
“The way the residents use the drainage as refuse can is appalling; the water is not flowing through the lined drain because of all the rubbish and soak away.
“The water around that Olosha section is emptying directly on the road; it is not allowing the water to go where it is supposed to go,” he said.
Emeter appealed to the residents to use the LAWMA-designated points where large refuse collectors were provided for sanitation of each area rather than the drains.
He also urged the state Ministry of Health to sensitize the residents on the health implications of channeling sewage to drains in order to avert epidemic.
According to him, the agency has compiled the list of all the bad roads in the state, including Lagos-Ota-Abeokuta expressway and reported it to its headquarters.
Emeter said that FERMA would swing into action on mass road intervention as soon as it received the funds needed for the projects.
“We are just waiting for funds before swinging into action,” he said.
