Group Blocks Benin-Auchi-Abuja Highway over Abandonment  Since 2013

Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City

A group known as Concerned Edo Citizens (CEC), for the second day, blocked the Auchi axis of the Benin–Ekpoma–Auchi-Abuja Highway over the abandonment of the reconstruction work on the road, which has been on since 2013.

The group mobilised residents and other road users yesterday who made the road completely impassable and at the popular Jattu Junction, mounted canopies, made fires and cooked food and meat for the people.

The protesters also got the sympathy of the truck drivers’ union within the axis as they deployed their vehicles to block the junction, which is a gateway to vehicles plying the highway.

The blockage witnessed a long stretch of trailers blocking one lane of from Jattu Junction to Okpella and Agbede with a lot of inconvenience to other road users.

Recall that a similar scenario occurred last year, which led to assurance by the officials of the Federal Ministry of Works through two royal fathers from the area, the Otaru of Auchi and the Ogieneni of Uzairue to kick-start the rehabilitation of the road.

Similarly, the senator representing Edo North at the Senate, Senator Adams Oshiomhole, recently lamented that the paltry sum of N200 million was voted for the reconstruction of the road in the 2024 budget.

A lecturer in the Federal Polytechnic said yesterday that “going around Auchi and environs have been tough in the last two days because the blockade of the highway spiraled into adjoining roads and streets in the town.

“One cannot even drive with the current cost of fuel so commercial vehicles have been the option adopted to move around the town.

“But it is rather unfortunate that the government can subject its own citizens to this kind of hardship. No security, no light and no road for the people.

“Is it not an embarrassment that the federal government cannot complete a road they started since 2013. They have not even gone halfway in the construction.”