The Federal Executive Council (FEC) of Nigeria has approved the memorandum presented by the minister of works for road contracts worth N432.8bn ($183m).
Supervising minister of information Dr Nurudeen Mohammed said that the council approved the memorandum for the award of the construction contract, as well as the rehabilitation of 17 strategic roads and bridges.
The contracts will be carried out under categories A and B in the first batch of road and bridge projects.
The roads included projects located in the states of Borno, Yobe, Gombe, Rivers, Bayelsa, Delta, Enugu, Nassarawa, Abia, Niger, Kogi, Cross River, Lagos and Kaduna.
The rehabilitation of Damaturu-Biu road and the Gombe-Kaltungo Section of Gombe-Numan-Yola road are also included in the project.
Once awarded, the projects are expected to generate employment for engineers, technicians, artisans and unskilled labour in Nigeria.
According to the minister, a federal government’s delegation would soon visit China for talks on a $500m EXIM loan for the projects.
The N11bn ($61m) funding for these projects will be from the ministry’s 2014 Appropriation Act and N10bn ($56m) from SURE-P, and the remaining would be provided in subsequent budgets.
The minister said that approval has been received for projects, including the Bodo-Bonny road in Rivers State with three major bridges across Afa Creek, Opobo Channel and Nanabie Creek, the new Ikom Bridge, the Agae-Katchia-Baro road in Niger State and the reconstruction and dualisation of Aba-Port Harcourt and Enugu-Lokpanta sections of the Enugu-Port Harcourt expressway.
The new projects were included in the 2014 Appropriation Act of the National Assembly and are expected to create more than 13,500 jobs.
