Highway To Where? – Independent Newspaper Nigeria

 Beyond being a transformative infrastructure project aimed at connecting Nigeria’s southern coastline, the story of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway represents the interplay of competing interests in undertaking monumental economic projects.

 When President Bola Ahmed Tinubu came into office on 29 May 2023, he inherited an economy that was—and essentially still is— struggling with sky-high un­employment and immense debt. He assured Nigerians that he would ‘repay [citizens] through massive investment in trans­portation infrastructure…and other public utilities that will improve the quality of lives.’ He attempted to follow through by kicking off his administra­tion with the end of Nigeria’s fuel subsidy programme. While experts from the International Institute for Sustainable De­velopment backed the move, agreeing that the subsidy had become an increased financial burden, the decision thrust the country into arguably one of the worst cost-of-living crises and unsurprisingly skyrocket­ed the cost of transportation, which ultimately affected the cost of food and services.

Though this proved too steep a change to make, as the Inter­national Monetary Fund sug­gested in May 2024 that there is an implicit subsidy in the government’s cap on petrol prices, it was a grand step in the new administration’s plans to tackle the country’s economy. Fast-forward to the present day and the Tinubu administration has taken another bold step in the direction of country-wide economic growth. It has intro­duced the Lagos-Calabar Coast­al Highway.

The federal government an­nounced the construction of the highway in March 2024. The government envisioned the highway as a modern transpor­tation artery and an ambition that symbolizes hope, unity and prosperity. According to the minister of works, Senator David Umahi, the highway’s development is estimated to cost up to ₦15.6 trillion ($12.5 billion) over an eight-year con­struction period. In a statement by presidential aide, Temitope Ajayi on X, the infrastructure is said to be ‘a monumental civil engineering project [that] will usher in a new era of ambitious road infrastructural develop­ment projects in Nigeria.’

The highway will stretch approximately 700 kilometres along Nigeria’s southern coast­line. Its purpose is to connect the country’s six geopolitical regions through nine states (Ogun, Ondo, Edo, Delta, Bayel­sa, Rivers, and Akwa Ibom) from the former capital city, Lagos, to Calabar, Cross River state. The project’s co-financ­ing structure places the bur­den of funding on the federal government and the contractor, Hitech Construction Company Limited. Through this model, the federal government will provide up to 30 per cent of the budget required to complete the undertaking while the con­tractor provides the rest. This method ensures that the high­way financing burden does not ultimately fall on citizens. The highway will support travel by car and train as it will include the construction of a dual car­riageway. Each carriageway will have five lanes and a train infrastructure in the middle.

When complete, the highway is expected to improve connec­tivity along the coast, leading to seamless transportation, a boost in tourism, and, ulti­mately, an improvement in cit­izens’ lives. It is also expected to increase economic growth by creating employment for tens of thousands and establishing better access to market centres for 30 million people.

HIGHWAY TO CONTROVERSY

So far, the path to the proj­ect’s actualization has not been without dispute. For starters, approving and kicking off the project has been riddled with conflict over allegations of lack of due process. One of the significant flaws in the procedure through which the project came to fruition was in the contract awarding process. Umahi maintained that due process was followed in the project’s awarding process. He explained that the contractor, Hitech Construction Company Ltd, was chosen because of its competency, track record, and capacity based on its previous projects within Nigeria. Uma­hi explained that the Public Procurement Act 2007 allows a company to be chosen for a proj­ect based on its skills. Hitech is a civil engineering contractor headquartered in Lagos, Lome, and Cotonou. The company has been operating for over 30 years and is responsible for several projects that redefined Lagos. Some of those projects include the ongoing upgrade of the Eti Osa-Epe expressway, the Air­port Road leading to Murtala Muhammed International Air­port (2023), the ongoing recon­struction of Ikorodu Road and the Bar Beach shoreline (2021). The company has also been con­tracted in Ibadan to reconstruct its toll gate and in Edo State to reconstruct its roads.

However, there were alle­gations of discrepancy in the award process. This led Hon. Dr Austin Achado, the lawmaker representing the Gwer East/ Gwer West federal constituen­cy of Benue State, to call for an investigation into the awarding of the contract to Hitech. He stated that the project bypassed laws put in place to ensure a fair and public process, there­by violating the Infrastructure Concession and Regulatory Commission Act 2005. The Act ensures a fair opportunity for open and public bidding from various contractors. This fail­ure to adhere to due process led to accusations of bias from former vice-president, Atiku Abubakar. Abubakar claimed that President Tinubu had a personal interest in awarding the contract to Hitech Con­struction Company Ltd. He stat­ed that President Tinubu’s son sitting on the board of Gilbert Chagoury, a company that owns Hitech Construction Ltd, creat­ed a direct conflict of interest.

Moreover, the federal gov­ernment’s failure to complete an Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA), a tremendous oversight, was called out by pan-Yoruba so­cio-political organization, Afenifere. In a statement by its publicity secretary, Justice Fa­loye, Afenifere explained that the federal government had not heeded to the complaints and calls for a review of the high­way. The group noted that not only would the project be envi­ronmentally damaging, but it had also blatantly ignored ESIA procedures. The minister of state for environment, Izaiaq Salako, further solidified this claim when he stated in an interview with Arise TV, that the ESIA certificate would be issued in conjunction with the construction of the highway, This meant that a comprehen­sive ESIA was not planned to be completed before the project kicked off.

CONFLICTING INTERESTS

Beyond process missteps, the federal government also mis­handled its engagement with stakeholders whose interests and businesses would be affect­ed by the highway. An instance of this was Landmark Beach Resort. The launch of the high­way’s construction cost Nige­ria one of its best beaches and caused damage to the region’s ecosystem. The beach, valued at over $200 million, was report­edly home to 80 businesses and provided 4,000 jobs. It also gen­erated annual tax revenue of over ₦2 billion. In the initial stages of the project, the min­ister of works assured Land­mark Africa Group, the prima­ry investors, that based on the original plan, no permanent structures or jobs would be impacted due to the highway’s construction.

However, an eventual govern­ment-issued evacuation notice based on an altered construc­tion route came as a shock to the chief executive officer of Landmark Africa Group, Paul Onwuanibe, who, in an inter­view with CNN in April 2024, said he was given only seven days to leave the property. In re­sponse to the notice, Onwuan­ibe filed a compensation claim and urged the federal govern­ment to return the highway to its original route. He stated that the initially mapped-out plan would save the businesses on the beach and the government money on construction costs. He warned that the destruction of the beach would be a huge loss, as millions of dollars of borrowed money had already been spent on developing the resort.

Amid the decisions on whether Landmark Beach Re­sort would need to give way to the project, the question of who had the right to the land was at play. On one hand, Onwuanibe claimed he acquired the land in 2007, well before the project was planned or announced. On the other hand, Umahi claimed much of the shoreline around Landmark that the project would eventually impact did not, in fact, belong to Onwuan­ibe and, instead, belonged to the federal government. As neither party conceded that the other had the right to the land, it’s fair to say a lack of due diligence in understanding the rightful owner of the land led to the loss of a prominent location 17 years in the making.

The highway’s new path also negatively impacted local communities. Within the Okun Ajah community, the new path for the coastal highway would have resulted in 490 houses being demolished. This led to widespread outrage, and com­munity members voiced their concerns in a stakeholder meet­ing. They highlighted that the new alignment threatened to uproot the community. The new path would destroy critical in­frastructures crucial to their livelihood as well as irreplace­able ancestral homes.

In the same meeting, tele­communications companies, MTN and 2Africa, pleaded with the federal government to return to the original route. They stated that the newly pro­posed path would cut across key communication and national security lines, which the coun­try could not afford to lose. In response to the plea of the community and telecoms com­panies, Umahi announced that the federal government would do away with the proposed new route and revert to the original­ly planned route.

Unfortunately, the decision to revert to the initially proposed path came weeks after Land­mark Beach Resort’s demoli­tion. If the federal government had conducted a thorough ESIA before the project’s launch, it would have uncovered the telecom lines and critical se­curity infrastructure sooner. In other words, if due process had been followed, the govern­ment would have retained the considerable investment that Landmark Beach Resort was to the country.

The irony of these losses lies in their occurrence during a project intended to revitalize the nation. The decision to em­bark on such a massive under­taking suggests a government committed to national progress. However, the apparent disregard for environmental and commu­nity concerns during the proj­ect’s early stages has justifiably raised doubts and scepticism.

The process of compensat­ing businesses and homeown­ers who had to give way to the coastal highway has also been met with complaints and dissat­isfaction. Although the govern­ment decided to return to the original path of the highway, the Okun Ajah community is still slated to lose 750 houses. The affected home and business owners have been compensated with what they claim is insuf­ficient to cover their losses. The founder of Leisure Games, Olanrewaju Ojo, who received ₦1.3 million in compensation, stated in a PUNCH interview that the compensation was only equivalent to a week worth’s of the business’s rev­enue. Landmark Africa Group also announced in a statement released on X that they were working with the government to receive adequate compensa­tion for their loss.

How the government intends to fully reimburse all those who have so far been affected by the highway’s construction is still unclear. The initial assurance that came with this project was that its construction would not financially fall on the citizens. It will be interesting to see if that remains the case as more compensation is required. We at least know that the admin­istration has started to pay compensation in phases and is continuously assessing claims to approve or deny.

THE COST OF A DREAM

Nigerians are familiar with the government making lofty promises but falling short in their execution. The Muham­madu Buhari administra­tion after eight years left the country in a grim state with increased inflation, unsus­tainable borrowing and debt, a decline in the value of the naira, and frightening unem­ployment numbers. The reality was in stark contrast with his campaign promises to bolster the economy, create jobs, and improve infrastructure.

Therefore, the Tinubu ad­ministration is under more scrutiny and pressure to fix the past and improve the future. This is why the Lagos-Calabar Highway will likely be recorded as a monumental feat. It could take Nigeria into an age of connectivity that could boost the economy to heights only dreamed of. What appears to be the trade-off is the cost to the country’s current well-be­ing on an environmental and economic level as well as on an individual citizen level.

One such cost is the potential effect on future investments in the country. Landmark Africa Group announced on X that it is exploring setting up resorts in three other West African countries and two different states in Nigeria. The group also detailed how it came into legal ownership of the land Landmark Beach Resort was built on. This is ultimately a troubling look for Lagos and Nigeria as a whole. For a coun­try that has been infamously called the ‘poverty capital of the world’, local and foreign investors could see this as a cautionary tale. The reality of this loss will likely be seen in a few years as Landmark Beach Resort was a notable tourist at­traction site.

Besides the potential eco­nomic loss caused by the de­struction of Landmark Beach, there is also the significant social loss of a leisure venue for people to enjoy in Lagos. Landmark Beach was a place where people could experience a semblance of fun and care­freeness in a country that is, on average, difficult to live in. It offered a variety of activities not easily found anywhere in the state and a well-kept beach people could find pleasure in. As it was a huge source of joy and relaxation, many Nigerians took to social media to express their sadness at losing such a vibrant beach resort. Com­ments from everyday Nigeri­ans on X reflected this as users expressed that the demolition was a difficult thing to witness to expressions of sadness at the loss of the one place you could go to stretch and relax. In a country riddled with hardship, the opportunity to unwind by a beach in a well-developed area was a much-needed relief, now tragically lost.

A SYMBOL OF HOPE, UNITY AND PROSPERITY

Over the years, the repeated failures of those who have gov­erned Nigeria have cultivated distrust among its citizens. At various points, protests, like the recent demonstrations, against bad governance have made it clear that Nigerians are fed up. As stated earlier, the country is arguably in one of the worst cost-of-living crises in a generation. Thus, there is a dire need for an econom­ic boost. This is what makes a project of this magnitude par­amount.

As construction has kicked off faced with arguably more reasons for Nigerians not to trust the government, this project has no choice but to succeed. Various stakeholders have lost their sources of liveli­hood in an economically uncer­tain time. Major investments both foreign and domestic have been destroyed, and allegations of underpaid compensation permeate the air. Ideally, the success of the project will re­sult in jobs created, increased trade, and reduced travel times, contributing to a more efficient and robust economy.

The next eight years are crucial. What happens with­in these years will determine whether the project is remem­bered as a lesson in successful infrastructure development or as a cautionary tale.

Source: THE REPUBLIC (https://republic.com.ng), Sep­tember 1, 2024.