iliyande:
My brother, I am one of the victim of the suffering. God will surely save us. see how people are dying in that road. #CHANGE.

iliyande:
My brother, I am one of the victim of the suffering. God will surely save us. see how people are dying in that road. #CHANGE.

zimoni:
What we need on that axis is train.

OREMUSSANCTUS:
Buh before jona we had many leaders, why didn't deh do d road? Wait for jona now

omenka:
Absolutely true!! I'm a witness.

LRNZH:


You are right but at least they should complete the Karshi road first to alleviate suffering of the masses on the short run.

LRNZH:


Abuja-Keffi Road is to the Federal Capital Territory what Lagos-Ibadan Expressway is to Lagos. Many workers who cannot afford the exorbitant rent in the FCT live in many of Abuja’s satellite towns on that axis. Such areas include Kugbo, Karu, Nyanya, Jikwoyi, Kurudu, Kpegi and Orozo.

Some others live farther into neighbouring Nassarawa State. They live in Mararaba, Masaka, Nyanya Gwandara, One Man Village, Ado, New Nyanya, Kuchikau, Lafia and even Keffi, the state capital.

While it is true that rents in these communities are far cheaper than what are obtainable in the city centre, residents of these communities too are not in any way better off.

Many of the settlements lack basic amenities. Some of them are also not properly planned. To compound the woes of residents, the traffic jam on the Abuja-Keffi Road, which is their only access road to the FCT, has lately become a nightmare.

Because of the ever rising population of those living in the affected areas, that stretch of road had from time witnessed serious traffic snarl in the morning while going to Abuja and in the evening when returning, due to the mass movement of people.

The situation was however compounded by the bus station bomb blasts recorded in Nyanya end of the road in April and May last year. Immediately after the first incident, soldiers attached to the Brigade of Guards were deployed to the Kugbo end of the ever-busy road. Those who thought that the military checkpoint mounted at that spot was just a temporary thing have since been proved wrong.

The soldiers use drums painted in military colour to block two out of the three lanes of the road to Abuja to ensure that traffic flows slowly at the checkpoint. This situation results into a traffic jam that stretches many kilometres. The Kugbo military checkpoint is just the main one on the road. There are others in Karu, Nyanya and Mararaba, among others.

The effect of these checkpoints is that a journey of 15 minutes to the city centre now takes three or four hours. Initially when it started, some residents resorted to waking up early and leaving for their offices as early as 5am before the gridlock would start. But that idea has now been defeated as more people adopt the style. Now, the confusion on the road starts as early as 4am and remains late into the afternoon. Sometimes, at 2pm, the situation on the road will still be rowdy.

The snarl on the expressway usually extends into the inner roads in Karu, Nyanya, Jikwoyi and Mararaba. While inside the traffic jam, it is normal to see school buses conveying pupils of nursery and primary schools trapped in the jam as late as 11am when they ought to have settled down for their academic activities. They will be seen sleeping inside the buses, having been woken up as early as 4am by their parents who equally want to leave their homes early.

Parents who drive their children to school have now devised another method. They will drive to a point where the traffic starts and ask their children to join commercial motorcycles for the rest of their journey. In case they do not get motorcyclists on time, the helpless children resort to trekking.

So tense is the situation that some residents have decided to abandon their vehicles at home. What they do is to ride on commercial motorcycles from their homes to a point close to the Kugbo military checkpoint. They will walk pass the soldiers and wait for commercial vehicles after the checkpoint. They are sure that from that point, they will not encounter any ‘traffic war’ again. But that system also comes with heavy price.

One, commercial motorcyclists now capitalise on that to charge exorbitant prices. Two, most of these residents stand on that highway for about 30 minutes or even an hour before getting vehicles. The reason is that the population of people waiting for vehicles there is always very huge.

This harrowing experience has led to many relocating from that axis to either Kubwa or Airport Road where access to the FCT is not as tedious. Some others who cannot afford relocation now manage with friends or in their office premises throughout the week and only return to their homes on Fridays for the weekend.

“The best thing that ever happened to me and my family is our relocation from Nyanya to Lugbe on the Airport Road. I can now drop my kids at school within 10 minutes of leaving home. It is indeed a great relief,” a man simply identified as Ben told our correspondent.

The greatest fear among residents now is the danger lurking around if terrorists decided to detonate bombs inside such a traffic jam. The effect is better imagined. “Since I can’t fly to my office, I have since started adapting to the traffic. But I must confess that any time I am inside that traffic, my imagination runs wild. I will look at the row of cars in my front and my back and imagine the colossal loss of lives and property if a bomb is detonated there. At that point, I will quickly shout ‘God forbid’ unconsciously,” a resident, Mr. John Okon, said.

The only set of people who seems to be happy about the situation are the commercial motorcyclists, who make cool cash by conveying passengers from one point to the other, charging exorbitant fares and hawkers who sell in the traffic.

The demands of the residents of the area are clear. One, they want military authorities to remove the checkpoint in Kugbo. Two, they are calling for a timely completion of the Karshi-Apo-Ara Road which will serve as an alternative route to the city centre. Of course, they are also calling for the extension of the Abuja-Keffi Road.

There are however indications that there are no plans to remove the checkpoint, at least, for now. In April last year, the then Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku, had appealed for public understanding over the security checkpoint, saying the measure was for public safety. He said the checkpoint was not to inflict pain on Nigerians.

“We feel the pain of our citizens and our hearts go out to those who, under the present circumstances, are compelled to endure long traffic queues because of the roadblocks that have been set up following the terror attack at Nyanya. We understand the pain citizens are going through. We want to appeal to them to appreciate the reason behind the challenges we are going through,” he had said.

He further urged the people affected by the security measure to see the roadblock as a form of sacrifice, aimed at addressing security challenges in the area.

The expansion of the road may also not come easily. In September 2014, the Minister of Works, Mike Onolememen, said the redesigning of the road was in progress in order to ease the incessant gridlocks. He said the road was one issue that had generated a lot of concern because of the vast large number of Abuja workers residing on that corridor.

Onolememen noted the traffic the road is handling is far in excess of the maximum it was designed to carry, saying the ministry was in the process of finalising the design for the expansion and dissipation of the traffic.

“We believe that the Abacha Barracks end should not and cannot be the only entry point into the city. So, we are going to do a kind of an arc diversion through which we will have a number of entry points into the city. We believe that is the design solution for that particular problem. It is a problem; there is not much we can do in terms of traffic control on that road, because the problem is a very fundamental one and it requires an engineering design solution,” the minister had said.

To expand the road, the government is looking forward to obtaining a loan from China. Onolememen said last year that his ministry had already procured the Certificate of No Objection on the project from the Bureau of Public Procurement.

There seems to be no word from the government on the alternative Karshi-Apo-Ara Road which some residents claimed had already been abandoned by the contractor.
With the forthcoming general elections being the major if not the only item on the government’s agenda for now, it is almost certain that for commuters using the Abuja-Keffi Road and other adjoining roads, their sufferings continue.

http://www.punchng.com/feature/nations-capital/suffering-continues-on-abuja-keffi-road/

sankky:
Never knew there's a place called "'One Man Village".
Anyway, its a shame that in this jet age, we still cant solve basic needs in Nigeria. thats why the Labour party has taken over Abia state without the need to share stolen money to the people in order to get their support.

Abians have started rejecting the attempts to bribe them with morsels of food and little cash by visionless and planless Guber candidates of the APGA and PDP parties. They are demanding for each candidate to lay down his plans for Abia because Abians are not beggers.
The shocker has just begun.

Labor party all the way.
visit www.emekaotimbagov.com to see the Abia state of your dreams