The Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA) says has disclosed that it has identified no fewer than ten critically damaged federal roads for urgent intervention in each state of the federation.
The Acting Managing Director, Nuruddeen Rafindadi, disclosed this on Friday Abuja during a media briefing.
According him, the agency is mandated to maintain and repair federal roads to ensure that the roads last long, adding that so far the agency had about 380 to 400 bad spots that had been identified and documented for repair.
“Arising from all these, we compiled what we call a maintenance or repair work plan for the next nine months. This includes quick intervention programme which is targeted at doing what we can within that period depending on fund availability.
He said that since his assumption of office, the agency had been able to review procurement plan and status, set up monitoring teams that would access works done and verify financial status of projects.
Others are taking inventory of the entire agency’s asset, machinery, partnering with the media to educate the masses on the proper use of the roads.
“One of our major challenges is the attitude of Nigerian toward road usage; we need the media to assist in disseminating of information on the proper use of the roads and getting feedback from them to the agency,” he said.
He listed some of the challenges faced by the agency to include indiscriminate cutting of the roads, vandalism of road infrastructure and burning of tyres.
He said that many roads in the country were constructed 20 to 30 years ago and the structures which needed reconstruction currently were not part of the agency’s scope of work.
