Infrastructure, most legitimate way of wealth distribution — Fashola
By Blessing Wika, Abuja
The Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Raji Fashola, CON.SAN, has said that infrastructure development is the most legitimate way of distributing wealth in an economy, explaining that its impact on job creation and economic growth is very significant on the Nation’s economy
Fashola stated this, Wednesday, October 19, 2022 at the National Press Center, Radio House Abuja, during the media briefing of his Ministry’s scorecard during President Muhammadu Buhari’s Administration, 2015-2023. This is the inaugural edition of this series.
The event being coordinated by the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture, was presided over by the Honourable Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Muhammed.
According to Fashola, the Change Agenda which was unfolded in the Ministry of Works and Housing in 2015 as part of the larger objective of the Administration of President Muhammadu Buhari was to grow the economy through the revamping and expansion of the nation’s infrastructure on a scale that has not been seen in a long while.
“Indeed, the Ministry of Works and Housing is present in all the States of the Federation either through a Road, Bridge, National Housing Programme, Federal Secretariat or Special Intervention Project,” he said.
Explaining further, Fashola stated that in the last seven and half years, the administration of President Buhari has been very resolute in the pursuit of Progressivism, which is globally recognized as the improvement of the human condition, pointing out that the administration has never abandoned any project of the previous administrations but rather, President Buhari gave a marching order to complete existing projects instead of starting new ones.
Fashola asked, “If in 2015 the conversation was on the existence of a large number of abandoned infrastructures and the seeming lack of political will to complete those infrastructures in spite of the availability of resources and today the Buhari administration has made these possible in spite of lean resources; if in 2015 such critical infrastructure as the Second Niger Bridge, Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Abuja-Kaduna-Zaria-Kano Expressway were either totally non-existent or in a very deteriorated state and if today the Buhari administration has demonstrated that needed political will to break the jinx on our nation’s historically most difficult projects, does it not stand to reason to conclude that the Party which formed the Government deserves to continue to deliver to the people of Nigeria these life-defining infrastructures?”
Fashola disclosed that the Second Niger Bridge was now completed and will soon be opened to the public for use, pointing out that what was delaying the commissioning was the construction of the link road to the bridge from both the Asaba and Onisha axes.
“I can confirm that the Second Niger Bridge itself is finished. People can walk through it now. What remains now is the link roads,” he said
On Housing, the Minister said that the National Housing Programme that was initiated by the Ministry of Works and Housing at the onset of the Muhammadu Buhari-led administration had affordability and accessibility as key considerations.
He explained that with the Programme now in a season of completion, many of the houses have been completed and are now being handed over to the beneficiaries who follow the allocation procedure set out in the National Housing Programme web portal (nhp.worksandhousing.gov.ng)
“The National Housing Programme has therefore produced new home owners but in the process also produced citizens who found economic fulfilment as contractors, suppliers of various construction items and artisans,” he concluded.
