Cross River Governor Makes Case for Bakassi Deep Seaport Corridor

Abiola Seun

The Cross River State Governor, Ben Ayade says the Calabar/Odukpani dual carriage highway is receiving premium attention from his administration because it would play a major role as a veritable evacuation corridor to the Bakassi Deep seaport when completed as critical to the state’s economy.

A major gateway to other parts of the country, Ayade expressed optimism that the Calabar/Odukpani Highway, when completed, will also ease the perennial traffic gridlock at the Odukpani junction.

He who spoke during an inspection tour of the project maintained that he was delighted at the progress of work.

“The Calabar/Odukpani dualization project is intended to connect the spaghetti flyover and to do a proper evacuation of the gridlock we face at the Odukpani Junction.

This is a super project in the sense that it will perfectly ease traffic and also this is the road the Superhighway will be evacuating into and it will run on dual carriage into the six lanes and then into the Bakassi Deep Seaport.

According to Ayade, “This construction work is very critical for us because this is where you connect to Abuja, this is where you connect to the seaport, this is where you connect to Port Harcourt, the whole of the southern part, the northern part and up to the Cameroon.

“This is the only way, the gateway into Calabar. So it is our heartbeat, which is why we have focused on it as a priority.”

Commending the contractors for the quality of job, the Cross River state governor disclosed that the specification of the project was such that can withstand heavy duty trucks that ply the road daily.

Ayade:

“I am quite impressed so far with the quality of work done. Ordinarily they are supposed to lay the bitumen to 6cm and compact to 5cm but I have given an order for them to lay to 7cm and compact to 6cm to give it a higher thickness to have a higher tolerance level for some of these heavy duty trucks that are coming in to pick very heavy materials, picking petroleum products from the Calabar tank farms and the rest.

“I think the job that they are doing is great, the quality is good. I have seen the thickness of the asphalt, I have seen the consistency, I have seen the mixture and I am quite satisfied. The contractor has the capacity and competence to deliver on this job within a short time.”

He assured that construction of the Spaghetti flyover would soon take off: “In the next couple of week you will start seeing the construction of the spaghetti flyover and I want to use this opportunity to thank Cross Riverians who have stood with me through all the challenges of Covid-19”, he stated.