By Stephen Adeleye.
The Senator representing Kogi West Senatorial district, Sen. Sunday Stephen Karimi, has released N17 million to begin reconstruction of the abandoned dilapidated Pakuta bridge linking Aiyegunle Gbede – Kiri road, in Ijumu and Kabba Local Government Areas of Kogi.
Pakuta bridge links the road that transverse Aiyegunle Gbede community in Ijumu to Kiri kngdom in Kabba Bunu Local Government, and to Kupa North and South in Eggan communities in Lokoja Local Government Area.
The rehabilitation of the bridge will enable the communities along the road to experience a major relief as the road also linked some communities in Niger State.
Speaking about the road, Prof. Olu Obafem, the Asiwaju of Kiri kingdom, thanked Send. Karimi on behalf of the Olukiri and the entire communities for the release of intervention fund to reconstruct the bridge.
According to him, the road was awarded to a construction giant, Setraco Nig. Ltd. but was abandoned due to improper funding by the Federal Government, resulting to total collapse of the bridge, thereby cutting off many communities.
He stressed that the collapsed bridge had negatively affected the people whose major source of livelihood is agriculture, thereby making transporting their agricultural produce become a big challenge.
Prof. Obafemi, who is also the Project Committee Chairman, said the bridge reconstruction was valued at N17 million by the Committee of experts, stakeholders and community representatives in the area.
He, therefore confirmed that the Kogi west senator, had graciously released the fund to begin the immediate reconstruction of the bridge.
He promised that the committee would do everything possible to properly manage the fund and monitor the reconstruction process.
He said Senator Karimi had earlier promised to use his office as the representative of the people to look into the real problem with the funding of the road as contained in the original agreement between the Federal Government and Setraco Nig. Ltd, in a bid to return the Contractor to site to complete the road.
It would be recalled that Sen. Karimi, had in September last month disbursed N100 million to 50 women cooperative societies under his Constituency Empowerment Scheme .
The peoples orientated senator had also in July 2024, launched a registration portal of N100 million bursary award for 1,0000 students from Kogi West in tertiary institutions across the country.
