NIGERIA’S DEADLIEST HIGHWAYS

Fashola interview.

Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Raji Fashola has identified three major roads in the country that can pass as traveler’s graveyard, especially as it relates to fatal road traffic accidents.

The minister who revealed this when the newly elected members of the Standing Committee of the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE), led by its President, Mr. Mustapha Isah, paid him a courtesy visit in his office in Abuja last week, identified the roads as the Abuja-Kano road, the Akwanga-Makurdi road, and the Lagos-Ibadan expressway.

Fashola who relied on weekly data provided by the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) noted that, in the year under review, road traffic crashes claimed more lives than malaria and Covid-19 put together, adding that the carnage on the roads had become a major public health issue.

While pointing accusing fingers at male drivers and commercial vehicle drivers as being the biggest culprits in the fatal road crash debacle, the minister also spoke on sundry issues concerning the ministry. Excerpts:

THE CANAGE ON OUR ROADS

How to reduce the carnage on our roads is a very big public health issue.

We found out in January, this year, that over the years, more people died from road traffic crashes than people that were killed by malaria and COVID put together. We’re all busy about covid-19; wash your hand, use the hand sanitiser, mosquito nets and all, but the real silent killer is going unattended to. And it’s not this country alone. All over the world. Road crashes every day. I think it’s about 3,000 people a day, worldwide. One could also see that as our roads are getting better, casualties are increasing. Our maximum speed limit is 100 kilometres per hour. So, whatever you’re doing, you have just a life to live. You would have done this country a great good without over-speeding.

You see, FRSC is usually the first (official) arrival at every accident scene. So, they write us a monthly report. And we see the cause of the accident. We found that bad roads account for less than 2%. The big causes are Over-speeding: 30-something per cent, Loss of Control: 20-something per cent, Wrongful Overtaking: about 19 per cent or so, Brake Failure: about 15% or so. So, if you calculate all together, they’re already over 70%. So, if we can address those issues, we have already cut accident deaths by more than half.

We then found out that three roads account for the highest number of deaths: Abuja to Kano, Akwanga-Keffi, Lagos-Ibadan. Those are the three roads that account for over 50%. So, if we reduce road crashes on those roads, we half the number. We also found that commercial vehicles account for over 60% of accidents. So, all of the places for us to focus our attention are shown to us by data. The roads involved, the causes involved, the vehicles involved and all. We then found out also that, gender-wise, it’s 67% men, against women. So, we also know the type of people to talk to, or to advocate more to, to make more impact. And then, we also know the type of vehicles. It’s minibuses and trucks mainly… All of the parameters that cause accidents, you’ll see that they’re within our control, within the control of the driver. So, we focus on the person of the driver. If he is well trained to drive a car, if he is certified to drive a car, and he drives it according to the rules and regulations of driving a car, of 100 kilometres per hour maximum, then, much would be well.

WHY WE NEED CHINEESE LOANS

The minister also made a case to justify the federal government’s borrowings from China, saying it has become clear that the country’s infrastructure deficit, and the urgent need to begin to salvage the situation, cannot be addressed with the dwindling resources available to the government.

According to him, there is nothing wrong with borrowing if the funds are properly managed and tied to specific infrastructure projects, as President Muhammadu Buhari is currently doing. Hear him:

You can’t say, Okay, let’s reduce Health when a new wave (of Covid-19) is coming. You can’t say you won’t do too much of Education. Or security. Your balance sheet is not how much you have in the bank. How good your balance sheet is, is determined by the look on the faces of your people. The people that you are leading. How happy are they?

So, we should drop this notion of ‘borrowing is bad.

However, above anything else, every concern about borrowing and how we spend the money borrowed is legitimate. It is not misplaced. But the notion and fear about not borrowing is an antiquated way of thinking.

My take on it is that it was those who colonized us, whom we consider the leaders of civilization, who taught us that ‘he who goes a borrowing, goes a sorrowing. But that was then. After a while, they realized that he who does not go a borrowing will remain a sorrowing.

And so, they created a new conversation and set new paradigms: benchmarking your debt to your GDP, Benchmarking your debt to your revenue, benchmarking your revenue, to your debt service. And say, if you’re within a certain percentage, you’re fine. And then they realized that leadership and rulership of the world are determined by infrastructure. And you know what they did? They’ve borrowed to build the best infrastructure, the best schools, the best roads, the best hospital, the best airports, the best trains.  And they left us still not borrowing and a sorrowing. And because we don’t want to go a sorrowing, we went ‘travelling.  And you know, every time we go overseas for C-check, medicals, education, who’s paying for all that? You’re actually paying for their debts. Wake up and smell the coffee! They keep telling you ‘don’t borrow from China’, but go and look in their backyard (of the same people discouraging you from borrowing from China). Go and look at their debt profile. They’re borrowing from China. Massively! In trillions!  That’s how they’re financing the massive projects.

So, we need a new level. A totally new level. I can tell you from the top of my head because I know, up till, at least, last year, December, I don’t know about tomorrow, over 80% of the antibiotics used in the United States is made in China. Antibiotics! The (…) Power plant in the UK is been funded by the Chinese. It is the most expensive power project in recent memory… So, borrowing for investment in infrastructure is sensible, smart spending. So, we have China Exim loans, for example. We’re using them for our rail projects. Okay? Rail is a hundred-year infrastructure; it lasts three generations. And if we do it today, those who will come in 50 year’s time, will come and meet the assets you bought 50 years ago. They’re still working.

So, you can choose to say, okay, no borrowing. Be saving your money. By the time you get there, the value of your savings has gone. Do you remember that Fela song about the man who wanted to buy a fan? Every time he finally wants to buy, the exchange rate would change. (Laughs) We can do that option too. So, all this strange argument about incurring debt for future generations, America is sitting on 20-something trillion dollar debt. But the child that arrives there today, is going to get first-class care. Let him pay for it. They invested it for his benefit, using the best deals. And now, their President says I want to spend two more trillion dollars. So those who have, are even borrowing more are spending more than us. So, how do you catch up?

But you know the debate they’re having? They’re saying, Mr President, two trillion? Okay, come and tell us how you’re going to pay for it. That’s the conversation. You know how? Tax! So you hear them say, no, we can’t increase this tax regime. So, let’s cut it. So, they now say, we’re cutting about half. Because you’ll need to pay for it. So that is the conversation. So, moving forward, when we say I want to be chairman, I want to be this and that, I want to do this, I want to do that, what plan (and how) are you going to pay for it. It is always the conversation that defines who wins an election. So, their task is to ask, are you going to tax the rich more? Or the poor? That’s the debate. There is no debate at all whether we want infrastructure or not. That’s given everybody is agreed on that. But, how do we pay for it? So, it’s your tax policy that determines who wins the election. So, you say the road is bad, you say the airport is not working, you say the railway is not working, is it the little money in your savings that’ll do it? Not really. So, let us understand the situation. We’re borrowing, we’re increasing our revenue collections, we’re also using strategic partnerships to provide some of these, like the Tax Credit Scheme with the private sector, like the Dangote Group and the NLNG are using. We’re also recovering some of the monies that were taken out of the country during the military era. And that’s the show of integrity in the new leadership. Remember those before now, they even shared the money after recovery… they shared the money 50/50…. But in the present setup, it’s unheard of.  So, these are some of the issues. Because the demand for infrastructure is not going away in a short time. And so, that ‘a sorrowing, borrowing mentality, we must begin to rethink it. Remember, there we a time we had $12 billion cash, in 2005. And these roads were not good then. There was no rail then. There were so many things we needed to do then. But, as a matter of policy, our country chose to pay classified debts and took 12 billion to that effect. I’ll not do that kind of thing. Never! I’ll tell the creditor: my children are in pain. They want to go to school. That’s a more pressing responsibility. So, that debt, we’ll reschedule it. When these children graduate, then from their salary, they can begin to pay back the debt. If our economy gets better, bigger, more efficient, then we’ll become more able to pay. So, those are major major policy differences between us and them. But them, I think you know them later (laughs).

ON SO MANY UNCOMPLETED PROJECTS AND SEVERAL OTHERS DRAGGING ON FOR SO LONG…

In terms of completing projects, again, I think it’s important you (media) help us enrich the minds of people. Just yesterday, we were analyzing the roads that have been completed. But I can tell you some of what we have done.  But then, I must make you understand; we are not building city roads. By the constitution, our responsibility is interstate roads. So, we’re not local government, or state, where you build one-kilometre road and commission. We often don’t commission completed projects. I know those places where we built inside our federal universities, yes, there was commissioning, but, how do we close down Abuja-Kano road, for instance, to say you want to commission it? Or Lagos-Ibadan, or Enugu-Port Harcourt or Enugu-Onitsha or Akwanga to Makurdi. How do you close that one? Unless you’re not a serious person. But now, I’ve started thinking about how we can have at least a small ceremony, because, I think, that is the mentality that if there is no ceremony, it means they have not done it. So, it’s important – just for record purposes, that is why I brought this (handing out a compendium of key projects been handled by the ministry). We build our roads in sections. So, maybe, we close 10 kilometres, of the North-bound side. We then divert all the traffic to the South-bound side. For safety, we lock if off, so that you don’t go and run into our workers. When we finish this 10 kilometres, we open it back, and you start using it. Have we not completed 10 kilometres? We have! You’re already using it, without commissioning. There’s nothing to do there again. So we close the other lane and continue. That is how we build federal roads. So, I beg to, to help us educate people.

FALLACY ABOUT 17 MILLION HOUSING DEFICIT

Fashola also faulted what he described as the unchallenged falsehood about Nigeria having a 17 million housing deficit, saying the claim is not corroborated by any research, study or data. According to the former Lagos State Governor, the claim was contained in an internal departmental memo in which someone just flew to give some kind of credence to an approval he/she was seeking, and that it had since stuck, and gone unchallenged.

Fashola said although there might be some pressure on housing in urban areas, largely due to urbanization and migration, the country is replete with many unoccupied residential buildings. His take: There are empty houses everywhere. In Abuja, Lagos, Onitsha, in  Ibadan. Everywhere. So, the problem is, therefore, not really that of housing deficit… This was our case at the council on Lands and Housing in Jos this year….

Before we even begin to talk about the future, what do we have that is unused? That is how logical people think. What is available? So, why are people not renting houses?

Housing must be seen from two prisms: ownership and rental. That’s how it’s seen all over the world. You either own or rent. Because of the financial requirements involved. Why is the NGE president’s house in Abuja unrented for two years? The problem is that he’s probably asking for three year’s rent, from this Perm. Sec., whose small, one month, salary sometimes comes in arrears. But the landlord wants to rent from the same salary, to be paid three years in advance. It’s an economic mismatch. It won’t happen. And even if it happens, we then have to take a closer look at the perm. Sec, to see if he has not compromised the system. So, even if the Perm. Sec. is able to bring out the three years’ rent at a go, and you accept it, the joke is actually on you, because you’re going to pay it back somehow. Because that is not the natural course of things! You’ve altered a natural behaviour. And would pass that cost around. So, can we persuade Mr. President, reduce this rent, and bring it down to six months?

Instead of buying a house for N15 million, can you please be real? Tell him to pay over five years. If he’s an employee, tell his employer to sign him a bond; that every month, he would be deducting. And that if he’s going to sack him, he should let you know, so that you know he’s on his way out. These are some of the brass tracks solutions to addressing this problem. Because it doesn’t make any sense to just be building up houses, without anyone living there.

(FULL TRANSCRIPT OF INTERACTION LATER)