By Seyi Babalola
The Ebonyi State branch of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has spoken out against plans by the Minister of Works, David Umahi, to build Nigerian highways using concrete technology.
Recent instructions from Umahi to contractors managing federal road projects around the nation call for abandoning asphalt in favor of concrete technology and manual labor.
The minister said that when he was governor of Ebonyi State, he employed concrete technology for building roads.
But reacting to the minister’s directive on Friday, Publicity Secretary of the PDP in Ebonyi, Comrade Chika Nwoba, urged President Bola Tinubu and contractors handling various road projects to stop the proposed use of concrete technology and direct labour for road construction.
In a statement made available to newsmen in Abakaliki, the PDP condemned the proposed use of concrete technology in the construction of federal highways in the country.
The party also declared that Umahi’s claim that the concrete roads he did in Ebonyi State will last for 50 years as untrue.
The PDP publicity secretary, Nwoba, alleged that the direct labour approach to road construction deployed by Umahi in Ebonyi was just a conduit for personal enrichment.
Nwoba said, “It’s not in doubt that David Umahi is some sort of experienced construction engineering personality, but some qualities lack in the ways he administers any office he finds himself in every material point in time.
“We are from Ebonyi State and are direct witnesses to how he ran the works sector as governor of the state of Ebonyi for eight years.
“It will take the National Assembly or the President himself to dissuade him (Umahi) from applying direct labour and concrete pavement technology on all the construction projects his ministry is going to undertake.”
