*Says “It Was Racketeering From The Very First Day,” Questions Award Of Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway Contract
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Former First Vice President of the Nigerian Bar Association, John Aikpokpo-Martins, Esq., has said the Lagos to Calabar Coastal Highway “was never intended to be completed”, and that the project was designed only to open up the Lagos corridor.
He was speaking on Arise Television following the announcement by the Minister of Works that the highway will deviate from its original master plan in Ondo State and run inland to meet the East-West Road in Edo State, a decision the Minister attributed to the discovery that much of the Ondo coastland is peat, which would raise construction costs exponentially.
“From the very point that the Minister made that announcement, so many questions arose immediately. The first thing that struck me was the sincerity of government from the very first day, because at the time that contract was awarded, all Nigerians knew that it didn’t follow proper procedures.”
“For a contract that was awarded for such a huge amount of money overnight, there was no assessment, whether engineering assessment, whether environmental impact assessment, or any other kind of assessment at all. It was obvious that the government was not serious.”
“I told those who were close to me, I even made some comments in a lawyers’ group, that for those who can discern very well, that coastal road was never intended to be completed. It was only intended to open up the Lagos corridor for the purpose of satisfying, I don’t want to use the word tribal, but sectional interest, let me use that.”
“And I also have the feeling that even before that announcement was made, all the land around that corridor has been bought over by interested parties, who, now that the road is present, are now selling those lands they bought at that time when nobody knew that the coastal road was going to be built, and now selling those things for millions and billions of naira.”
“So for me, it was racketeering from the very first day, to open up the Lagos corridor particularly. It was never intended that it was going to be completed from Lagos to Calabar.”
“How did they arrive at that figure in the first instance? Did they not look at the [feasibility] of the environment itself? The so-called swampy areas and waterlogged areas, did they not see that, and did not factor that in before arriving at the contract sum?”
“So it simply means that they never factored in anything. They just gave out money for the purpose of collecting money. That is my personal view.”
“So what is happening now is just trying to sell us a dummy to end up exactly where they want to end up.”
Mr. Martins gave the contract sum as “about 50 trillion naira” and, later in the same answer, as “15 trillion naira”. The inconsistency is his and is flagged in the verification note below.
Asked what legal remedies exist for property owners whose properties were demolished along the original route:
“From my understanding, where they are diverting now, they are diverting from [Ondo] State. They have not gotten there at any given time. I don’t think they have demolished any building at all or taken over any piece of land before now. They were coming from Lagos, from Victoria Island precisely.”
“So if, for example, they have demolished properties there, there is no way they could have demolished property without paying compensation, because under the Land Use Act you cannot acquire property for public [purpose] without paying compensation.”
“So assuming they did that, the fact that they have diverted is of no moment. All that matters is that they must be paid their compensation, and if they have not been paid, then they have a right to go to court to sue for compensation.”
He said the greater loss falls on communities that were never going to be compensated because nothing of theirs was taken.
“Some of these communities are outside the immediate civilisation, let me put it like that. They are deep inside the swamp. So they were expecting that by the construction of this road, maybe that side would be opened up.”
“It is those expectations now that have been dashed that are even more important than any other thing now, because those are the ones who were expecting that the road was going to pass through.”
“So they are the persons who are going to suffer more, because it is a generational issue. If that road had gone through those areas, for years, for 100 years, that would have opened up those areas. Now that they are diverting the road to go and meet the East-West Road, those areas are locked back into the ages. The opportunity for them to have opened up those areas is lost.”
Asked whether affected communities could challenge the change of alignment on grounds of inadequate consultation, environmental harm or failure to follow statutory procedures:
“They don’t have any remedy in law. If land had been acquired or taken from them, the entitlement to compensation would be given to them. The government had, for good reasons [changed the route].”
“It is a government policy. Government had decided to change its policy. So at what point will you sue because government changed its policy? For what? If you go to claim in court, I don’t see any [basis].”
“What they can do is to keep lobbying, hoping that maybe the government will change its mind, or maybe another government, when it comes, because of the outcry, decides to go on with the original plan.”
“That is my thinking. They don’t have a right of action against government for changing its policy on taking the route through the initial route to a new route.”
Asked what role the Bar can play to ensure that mega infrastructure projects comply with the rule of law:
“The problem in Nigeria is that we tend to forget everything after this outcry. Maybe tomorrow a new story will come up and we all forget, including [the broadcasters] and all the others. We forget and go to new things.”
“The fact is that from the very first day that contract was said to have been awarded, several laws were breached. The Public Procurement Act was not followed. There was no advertisement, nothing. The next thing we heard was that government has awarded such a huge amount of contract to one company.”
“Was due process followed? No. Did the National Assembly do anything? They didn’t. Did the Nigerian Bar Association do anything? They said nothing. We the lawyers, did we say anything? Everybody kept quiet. We were just grumbling.”
“We grumble too much without doing anything. So the government just looks at it and says, they will just shout as usual, after some time we calm down, we go to a new story, and that’s just the way it is.”
“So the country itself is complicit. We are all involved, or we are all guilty of not following up. The award ought to have been challenged from day one. That was what the government ought to have been battling, the challenge to the contract itself. But we kept quiet.”
“They have paid about close to three trillion already. Their initial plan has already been met. The Lagos corridor has been opened, money has been voted, people have collected. Now we can stop. It’s a plan. It’s a scam from day one.”
“They have done what they planned to do from the very first day, and we are just grumbling, just waiting for the next story.”
“The diversion will not take place. It has ended. Truthfully, watch it, whether that diversion will ever take place. At least not in this administration.”
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