800 Road Contracts Were Awarded Under Buhari – Fashola
Babatunde Fashola, the Minister of Works and Housing, claimed on Thursday that the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd. ), had given 800 contracts in the last six years.
Fashola also stated that, contrary to allegations that Nigeria has a housing shortage, the real issue is urbanisation, which has resulted in an inflow of people from rural areas into urban areas, posing a demand and supply problem.
Fashola made the remarks during the Presidential Communication Team’s weekly ministerial briefing at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.
He said “The number of contracts awarded is 800, not 800 projects. Sometimes within a road, you might have multiple contracts.
“For instance, from Kano to Maiduguri, there are five different contracts that are unique. If you look at the Lagos-Ibadan Road, there are two contracts there. For Enugu-Port Harcourt there are five contracts there.
“So, each one has a designated supervising project officer; so in that sense, it is right to say we have 800 plus contracts.”
He said, “It’s illogical to say we have a housing deficit when you have empty houses. No such deficit exists anywhere in the world.
“We are not in a housing crisis. Housing shortages that exist are in urban centres, not in rural areas. The problem is as a result of urbanisation where people move from rural to urban centres.”
The minister said he had liaised with some international development organisations including the African Development Bank and realised that the Nigerian housing deficit statistics were incorrect.
He, therefore, urged Nigerians to disregard the 17-million housing deficit claim.
Nigeria’s actual housing deficit could not be established until the country runs another census, he added.
