After Keffi-Makurdi road, FG to toll Lagos-Ibadan expressway, 2nd Niger Bridge

After Keffi-Makurdi road, FG to toll Lagos-Ibadan expressway, 2nd Niger Bridge

The Federal Government says it will toll the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Second Niger Bridge, Abuja-Kano Road, and other major roads in the country after their reconstruction or renovation.

Minister of Works, David Umahi, said the government would start the tolling with the Keffi-Makurdi road already completed.

Umahi spoke on Thursday in Abuja at an Inter-Ministerial Press Briefing as part of activities to mark Nigeria’s 64th Independence Anniversary.

“We have the Lagos-Ibadan (Expressway), we are completing it and we are tolling it,” he said.

He listed the Second Niger Bridge, Abuja-Kano Road, and Makurdi-9th Mile, among others slated for tolling.

Umahi, a former Ebonyi State governor, said the tolling of federal roads would “bring a lot of money to the Federal Government”.

He said private sector members had been engaged “to bring in funds, construct these roads, work with the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission and the Ministry of Works to toll these roads”.

He said, “We are completing the Lagos-Ibadan, we are working on Makurdi to 9th Mile in Enugu State, we are working from Abuja to Lagos.

“These roads are going to be tolled. But we are not just tolling them, we are bringing confidence in the use of these roads.

“If people can travel at night because we are bringing security, where the response time will be 10 minutes on the entire corridor, where you have solar light permanently there and then reduce travel time, and through the tolling, the roads are maintained, then, there will be confidence because Nigerians will pay if the roads are good.”

He said before now, road developments were handled as investments but the administration of President Bola Tinubu had been handling road developments more professionally.

In April, the minister hinted that the government would likely charge an average of N3,000 per toll gate for vehicles using the Lagos-Calabar coastal road upon its completion.

Umahi said, “Let me leave out the infrastructure along the corridor. Let me just concentrate on the tolls and I put 50,000 vehicles as an average passage on these toll points per day,” Umahi said .

He added, “In 15 years, you make back the money,” dismissing calls that the cost budgeted for the road project was high.

The minister noted that there will be security at the toll gates and some facilities like filling stations.