By Olasunkanmi Akoni & Monsur Olowoopejo
LAGOS — LAGOS State Government, yesterday, declared the Third Mainland Bridge safe for public use following apprehension raised in some quarters over the bridge’s condition.
The government, however, stressed the need for regular maintenance programme by Federal Government.
This came as Lagos appealed to Federal Government to make good its promise by refunding the N51 billion it spent over the years for the rehabilitation of Federal Roads in the state.
Commissioner for Works and Infrastructure, Dr. Obafemi Hamzat, spoke during the 2013 ministerial briefing on the activities of his ministry and to mark the sixth year of Governor Babatunde Fashola’s administration.
Hamzat said: “Federal Government last year shut the Third Mainland Bridge for about four months, to carry out maintenance works on the bridge.
“The bridge was closed so that the expansion joints could be repaired. It was designed as a county leaver that is why it vibrates when vehicle moves on it. This doesn’t mean the bridge is not safe.” It is safe. There is need for Federal Government to visit the bridge and carry out checks on it to ascertain its stability.
“We know that for them to carry out any check, someone will need to go under the water to see if the base of the bridge is stable.
“Therefore, Federal Government needs to put in place a maintenance structure for all its bridge, especially the Third Mainland Bridge, for those public facilities to serve the citizens longer than expected.”
… launches audio-visual kit for drivers
By Monsur Olowoopejo
LAGOS — Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State, yesterday, inaugurated Drivers’ Education Multilingual Audio-Visual Training Aid and stressed the need for effective adherence to road safety measures in the state.
Fashola, who inaugurated the self-training kit tagged Defensive Driving in Ikeja, said the visual-audio kit, produced in Nigeria’s major languages, would help to sensitise residents, especially drivers, on road safety measures.
He said: “It will further reduce the number of road crashes recorded yearly within the state. Nigeria today has the highest cases of road accidents in Africa.
“In the first half of 2012, 1,936 people were killed through road accidents and 162 per 100,000 people die of road accidents in the country.
”If this must be reduced, the drivers are important because they decide the vehicle’s speed, the route and when the vehicle operates daily.
“The vehicle and the road aren’t important to my administration than the life of the driver and the passengers, who would be affected when accidents occur in the state.
”From one accident, many families are affected directly by an act that could be avoided. Many have stopped school due to accident, since their breadwinners have passed on to the other side through accident.”
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