ICRC identifies problems stalling second Niger Bridge

The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission on Wednesday told President Muhammadu Buhari some of the reasons why the construction of the second Niger Bridge cannot go ahead in its current format.


The commission’s Director-General, Mr. Aminu Diko, in an interview with State House correspondents after briefing Buhari of its activities in the Presidential Villa, Abuja said the ICRC was currently withholding its Certificate of Compliance for the project.

He said the certificate was being withheld because of many issues regarding the project that the commission was not comfortable with.

Diko said his commission was engaging the Ministry of Works on how to resolve the issues.

Specifically, he said ICRC had asked the ministry to review the cost of the project with a view to justifying it.

He also identified the clamour for compensation by owners of the land where the project is being sighted as one of the pending issues.

Diko said, “The issue of the second Niger Bridge is one of the projects that we discussed with the President.

“We did say that the project is in the commission for regulatory oversight. We have been discussing the transaction with the Ministry of Works.

“But before it can be finalised, the commission has to give a certificate of compliance, but we have not done that because we have seen a lot of issues that we are uncomfortable with.

“We are talking with the Ministry of Works for them to correct it. The communities around that area are clamouring that their lands have been taken and that they have not been compensated adequately.

“As a matter of fact, we got a letter from Onitsha Traditional Council, complaining that they have not been adequately represented in this transaction.

“With this kind of issues, we are not saying that something has not been done properly but we need to be convinced that these few problems are sorted out properly.

“We will also talk about the actual cost of the bridge, eventually we have asked the Ministry of Works to review it and justify how much the project should cost.”

When probed further, Diko said he had no idea of the present state of the project which groundbreaking was done with fanfare by the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan.

He however said it was normal for projects under the Public Private Partnership to take time.

He explained that there would be a lot of studies, including integrity test, that will be done in the bridge.