Ikpoba Hill Residents Cry to Gov. Okpebholo for Speedy Completion of Benin-Asaba Road Project

A.......as contractors appeal to residents, commuters for patience 

The Chairman of Ikpoba Hill Youth Association, Comrade Kingsley Osemwingie and residents of Ikpoba Hill have appealed to the federal government through the Federal Ministry of Works, the Edo State governor, Senator Monday Okpebholo, to urgently intervene in the ongoing efforts to remedy the dilapidated Benin- Asaba road which has become impassable because of its deplorable state.

He made the call yesterday in Benin City the Edo State capital while leading some youths in a 

 peaceful protest at the worsening road site.

Speaking to newsmen at the site, Comrade Osemwingie decried the seemingly inability of the contractor handling the job to do a proper rehabilitation of the stretch of the road starting from the Tony Dee axis down through Living Faith Church, aka Winners Chapel all through to the Two Sisters and down to Okhuaihe in Uhunmwode local government area of the state.

In a swift reaction, the representative of the contracting firm and Chief Executive Officer of the Benin- Asaba Expressway Construction Company (BAECC), Mr Edafe Shingles appealed to residents to be patient as the road would have been completely washed during this rainy season if not for the palliative work it did on the road.

The Chairman of Ikpoba Hill Youth Association then appealed to Governor Okpebholo, Minister of Works, Engr. David Umahi to prevail on the contractors to speed up work on the road as a lot of man hour is being lost by commuters and residents on the area.

According to him, "We are calling on the Federal Minister of Works, Sen. Engr. David Umahi, the Edo State governor, Senator Monday Okpebholo to urgently come to the aid of Ikpoba Hill people and the commuters plying the Benin- Asaba road as the contractor handling the job has completely messed up the entire stretch of the road. The rehabilitation job he was expected to do has thrown the inhabitants of the area and road users into disarray as the road has been destroyed completely.

"The contractor has dug up and removed the entire existing coal tarr and left it bare and the development has further worsened the already precarious road situation.

"The governor came the other day with the contractor, tractors and other equipment to perform the ground breaking ceremony for the rehabilitation of the road which has become a nightmare and residents of Ikpoba Hill, commuters and other road users were excited as the road had drawn the attention of government.

"Right now work is not ongoing and our children can no longer go to school and our wives and mothers now trek long distances to the market because buses and other vehicular movements are restricted in the long stretch of the road and whenever it rains, you find trailers and other vehicles falling off with their loads while others break down in the ditches making access to the road impossible. Yet, no feasible work has been done on the road except that the road is now worse off.

"We want to first and foremost appreciate the governor of the state for his urban and rural infrastructural facelift going on simultaneously around the three senatorial districts of the state but we would appreciate it if he can spare some time from his busy schedule to come and inspect what the contractor is doing at the road site because he is wasting public funds".

Similarly some residents and road users who spoke to newsmen lamented the deplorable state of the road.

According to Osarodion Osamudiamhen, a commercial bus driver, the deplorable road situation is taking a toll on his vehicle.

" Everyday my bus breaks down and I spend the little money I make from my transport business in continuous repair of the bus and I am no longer able to meet up with other needs and it is really telling on me. I am begging the government to stop the yearly palliative efforts and do a comprehensive repair on the road as the pallitives have wasted so much money without results".

Another respondent who spoke with newsmen at the site, Mr Festus Onondo, a trader who sells motor parts in the area appealed to the government for urgent intervention 

" When we saw this contractor we were happy thinking they came to repair this road. This contractor didn't come to repair this road but they came to spoil it. They came to drop more than 40 trips of sand and granite in our area but when the rain fell it washed away everything and now you can see there is no road".

In his reaction, the Chief Executive Officer of the Benin- Asaba Expressway Construction Company (BAECC), Mr Edafe Shingles appealed to the residents of the area, the general public, particularly commutters and other road users to be patient with them as their intention is to give the road a world class repair that would stand the test of time.

He said that his company won the concession right to build and operate the federal road starting from the CBN at the Akpakpava area of the Benin City metropolis down to Sawmill junction in Asaba.

According to him, " Our vision as BAECC is to make Benin- Asaba Expressway a world Class road and we cannot achieve that without the patience and cooperation of the people, and so, I am appealing to residents to desist from closing and blocking drainages because when you close a trench of water it will flow back to meet a devastating road. I am not happy that I lost hundreds of millions because of what I couldn't sustain because of the actions of people who felt they couldn't access their premises. We have gone again to re order for other draining trenches which is what we would have done at the later part of the project just to ensure that we control water. We are just waiting for the rain to subside and we would be on that road. So, we are appealing to people to be patient and stop interfering with our work because the project is for the good of all.

"We did the ground breaking event sometime in March 2025 and we started working around May 2025. Before we started our reconstruction work, the road from the Winners Chapel area down to the bypass was completely not motorable. You will agree with me that the road was completely dilapidated and as such it was traumatic for road users to navigate the bad road and because of the palliative measures we carried out, vehicles could move easier than before. The intention of the palliative was to ensure that the road was motorable before the comprehensive reconstruction would be done.

"But the behavior of trailer drivers has been affecting the pace of work because many of them drive through the construction work site not minding the ongoing work thereby destroying the remedial work which was intended to give access to motorists and other commutters before the comprehensive reconstruction from the whole stretch from the CBN down to Asaba would be achieved.

"It is no longer palliative but what we want to embark on is the permanent construction 

On the issue that the intervention came at the wrong time which is during the raining season, he pointed out that if the palliative efforts were not administered at that point in time, the road would have been cut off completely from the federal grid because according to him, "We got a node from the Ministry asking my company to do whatsoever we deem fit to ensure we immediately redeem the stretch of the road and as you are aware the whole of that road up to the bypass was not motorable and if we had waited any longer it would have been a much more greater disaster than what we currently have on our hands.

"I am appealing therefore to residents of the area to be patient with us and stop interfering with the work project and desist from blocking and closing the drain trenches because when that happens the water flows back to impede our work and such slows down the pace of work and make us spend more money", he concluded