South East Roads: Bishop Ezeokafor Calls for Probe of past Contracts.

The Catholic Bishop of Awka Diocese, His Lordship Most Rev. Paulinus Ezeokafor has called for the probe of previous contracts awarded in the zone which according to him, will drive a new dawn for fresh contracts in the South East.

He appealed to federal government to urgently fix the roads which he described as death traps, noting that further neglect of the roads in the zone could worsen the untold hardship the people are experienced at the moment.

Bishop Ezeokafor who stated this at St. Patrick's Catholic Cathedral, Awka while interacting with newsmen faulted the approach by successive government in handling the issue of federal roads maintenance and repair and other infrastructural development accruing to South Eastern part on Nigeria.

His words, 'When we talk of Enugu-Onistha expressway we are not happy at all. The federal roads in the country, especially this part of the country, have been a perennial problem.

'Sometimes, you do not know who is fooling who, sometimes you will hear that they want to invite Julius Berger to construct roads here and our own people will say they prefer a certain company to carry out the construction works.

'All said and done, if the government has the will they can take a stand on who to give the job when and how, because at the end of the day it's the federal government that would be blamed where it pertained to federal roads and federal facilities.

'The other day, we went to Port harcourt for a meeting, it was a terrible grid lock on the way, if you move through Aba, no way, if you move through Elele no way. Every road was blocked completely.

'Unfortunately, from same Elele to Rivers state was completed but our own from there to Imo state was there seeking attention to be fixed.

'One is not very happy the state of our federal road but the state ones is very wonderful. But the state road here are wonderful, neatly fix, especially the roads here in Anambra state.

'Federal roads in the south-east have become perennial problems, honestly federal roads in the region are nothing to write home about,' Bishop Ezeokafor stated.