FG to bring back tollgates on highways

The federal government says its planning to bring back toll gate on the country’s highways many years after it was scrapped by the Olusegun Obasanjo administration.

Recall that former President Olusegun Obasanjo had in 2003 scrapped all the toll gates because they had outlived their usefulness.

According to him, the N63 million which the toll gates generated daily was nothing to write home about even as he said that the gates constituted inconvenience to motorists and encouraged corruption.

He said the toll gates had been known to record serious vehicular accidents while portions of roads near many of them were full of pot holes.

But addressing journalists on Wednesday at the end of the federal executive council meeting in Aso Rock, Abuja, Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, who was joined by Lai Mohammed, his information counterpart, said there is no law against toll plazas in the country.

He added that some of the logistics being worked out before the reintroduction include acquiring more lands that will provide up to 10-lane plazas.

The minister also disclosed that the council had approved additional N15.765 billion for two roads in the country.

The roads are Suleja-Minna-Lambata road and Ibadan-Lagere-Ilesa bypass.

He said the two roads contracts approved on Wednesday were upward review from initially approved rates.

On the 101km Suleja-Minna-Lambata road, he said FEC also approved additional N12.6 billion, while additional N3.165 billion was approved for the Ibadan-Lagere-Ilesa bypass.