FEC approves N27.233 billion for construction of Gombe-Biu road

The Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting on Wednesday approved N27.233 billion for the construction of the Gombe-Biu road.

The Minister of Power Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola disclosed this to State House reporters at the end of the FEC meeting chaired by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

He was with the Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed and the Minister of Budget and National Planning, Udoma Udo Udoma.

According to Fashola, the road will support access to agricultural facilities, power plant and boost personnel movement.

He however disclosed that the approval did not include the 9 kilometer part of the road already constructed by the state government.

He said “We presented two documents, one was a Memorandum that required council approval and the other was a note to inform council. They are important because they follow closely and inter- relate with the economy and recovery plan. The first which was a memo was a  contract of the Gombe – Biu Road that connects Gombe State to Borno and also leads to Adamawa and Yobe. The contract was for N 27.23bn for a 117km.

“The entire road excludes the 9km that had been constructed by the Gombe State government. The strategic importance of the road is undeniable; it supports agriculture, access to our power plants – Dadin Kowa hydro power plants. It also helps security logistics to move personnel and troops to respond to distress calls.

“It also going to be critical in the resettlement of IDPS. It’s part of the North East Development plan so it ticks all the boxes in terms of development and so on and also as far as budget implementation is concerned, this is one further step in that direction.”

He said that the other matter has to do with investment in people, security of lives and property, which is the revised Nigeria national  building code.

He said “This code is 8 years behind its scheduled date and the first code   was delivered in 2006 and it was revised in 2009 and since then it was stalled. Needless to say we have completed and approved the new code at the National Council of housing which the Ministry of power posted in August this year. It is national binding already and just to inform council.

“The information that is critical is that it first adopts international building code  standards and it also seeks to improve fire protection systems   in buildings, public and private and In this time of harmattan, dry weather, this is the appropriate time to revise this kind of standards and hope that they can quickly kick in and people benefit from them  and we save lives and property.

“It also introduces the energy efficiency and green building methods into our national standards. Recall that the ministry had launched an energy efficiency building code earlier in the year and that has been incorporated as a national building code to ensure that people build more in compliance to global standard.

“You can position your building in such a way that people use more daylight, conserve energy, install fire heating systems that conserve energy. All of those are details that are aligned in the new Nigeria National building code. More importantly I will like to speak on the provisions that has been made in responding to the needs of people with disabilities, that’s  a very important position in the code now.

“Provision of hand grills in toilets and washrooms, hand rails in ramps, lifts and ramps in public buildings to do some electro fitting as we go on.provisions that specify the gradients of ramps  and some of the attempts to respond to this are too steep or sharp, responds to the needs of people living  with disabilities so this code also responds to that.”

According to him, the standard and quality of equipment used in building have also been reviewed.

“Because when the  Green…tower fire happened in London, we were in the period of finalising this code and that was part of the things we considered ,what lessons we could  learn from their experience where a high rise building suddenly burnt quickly before fire service could respond.

“In that case we have modified and restricted some of this equipment and materials that can now be used in building in Nigeria in the hope that it will save lives and property.” he said

The Minister of Budget and National Planning said that FEC approved N458 million for consultancy services on the review of the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP).

He said “Today  the federal executive council approved a memorandum that was brought by the Ministry of budget and National Planning to retain some consultants to help us to conduct some pilot labs .

“This is part of our implementation strategy for the economic recovery and growth plan and so we intend to conduct three labs- one in agriculture and transportation, one in power and gas and one in manufacturing and processing.

“The key objectives of the labs are as follows. One to identify all relevant key stakeholders from the public and private sector that are crucial in the  delivery and implementation of the ERGP initiative so as to create ownership early on  in the development process.

“We will review and re-evaluate the ERGP and sectoral plans against set targets and progress and will include identifying gaps in the current eco system and the key success factors will further deliver detailed  three phase implementation programme line by line implementation activities.

“We will identify entry point projects, we will identify key performance indicators, breaking down silos and encouraging  key players. Now the focus of the lab is to mobilise private sector investment to finance specific capital projects as you know public resources are limited so these labs will bring in private sector players.

“We will look at the various areas including infrastructure, manufacturing and bring them in and mobilise private sector financing and resources for the labs.

“So what council has approved today is that we bring in some consultants who did a similar thing in Malaysia to try to help us build our own capacity, they will just help us at the beginning and after that we will take over and do it ourselves.

“The cost of retaining the Malaysian consultants will be N458m. It is going to cover about three months, the duration of the lab is expected to last a minimum of 13 weeks. It will cover three phases – pre- lab activities for four weeks, phase two conduction of the labs themselves 6 weeks and Phase three, post lab activities three weeks and you will have for each labs you will have at least a 100 people from a cross section of the public and private sectors so that is the structure of the lab.

“So there will do the pilot one. Subsequent labs will not be them. They will help us; they will bring their international connections, reach and give it credibility. 500,000 dollars per lab.”