By Stanley Nwanosike
Enugu – The Africa Heritage Institute (Afri-Heritage) on Wednesday decried the deplorable condition of the Enugu-Onitsha road.
The Executive Director of the institute, Prof. Ufo Okeke-Uzodike, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Enugu that the road was a major impediment to business and human activities within the Anambra-Enugu-Ebonyi axis of the South East.
Okeke-Uzodike said that the state of the road was breeding poverty and further compounding the suffering of the people passing through it.
“The state of that road is an indictment on the leadership of the country.
“You begin to ask whether there is any government in the country or even at the state level.
“That road is a replica of a failed road that tells much about the deprivation and neglect the leadership of the country both at the federal and state levels had subjected the people to,’’ he said.
Okeke-Uzodike noted that the road had caused motorists to more labourious alternatives through Oji River by Ugwuoba, Oji River by Ufuma and Oji River by Ebenebe.
He said that motorists spend additional three hours by going through the alternative routes.
“Even these old roads that provided alternative is damaged by excessive movement and movement of heavy vehicles on these rural roads.
“These rural roads were not made to take the volume and rate of traffic they currently carry.
“Some portions of these alternative routes are already failing and turning to death traps for motorists as well.
“On the Oji-River-Ugwuoba alternative road, you usually have at least five articulated vehicles/trucks fall on the road daily which further compounds movement for motorists and commuters,’’ Okeke-Uzodike said.
He said that with the present condition, criminal elements had taken over the old roads.
Okeke-Uzodike alleged that they extorted money from motorists, especially at Nkwelle community as well as on the Oji-River by Ufuma and Oji-River by Ebenebe alternative roads.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the 105-kilometre road had gone from bad to worse with weed and farming activities going on in some portions.
Many private vehicle owners have stopped using their cars to travel to Onitsha from Enugu as they patronise transporters due to the bad roads.