That Avoidable Carnage

The tragedy of leadership in Nigeria is that it never acts in the interest of the people until something disastrous or serious violence erupts. A government’s duty is to protect the welfare of its people and for that reason, its actions are focussed on collective actions with the single goal of improving lives through provision of amenities, developing right policies and watching out for anything that runs contrary to its goals.
For Nigeria, the story is different. Even when the people cry and die, our duty bearers would rather opt to protect their personal goals which in most instances, tramples on the rights of the people.
Since the Obasanjo administration, the Port Harcourt/Eleme Road axis of the East-West road has remained in a degenerative state. A road that links the Rivers State to Akwa Ibom and Cross River states, a link to a major hub of the Nigerian economy. Eleme is host to the Indorama Eleme Petrochemical Company, the Port Harcourt Refinery and Onne Port as well as the Onne Free Export Zone. Eleme itself hosts over 250 oil and gas related companies in addition to the ever growing population serving these companies.
With Nigerian economy energy based to the tune of over 70 per cent, such a road in a sane society, deserved premium attention but, that has not been the case with the Port Harcourt-Eleme Road. Despite daily depreciation, it remained unattended to, only experiencing hurried emergency patches when the excellencies have need to pass through it; like when former president, Dr Goodluck Jonathan dragged guests from across the country down to Okrika for the burial of his mother-in-law.
Frustrated by the neglect, companies operating in that axis acting to save their business and staff, went into a pact with ex-governor Nyesom Wike for a make-over of the road, providing respite for a short while. These were temporary measures not strong enough for the weight of traffic that plies this all important route that hosts heavy duty trucks from the refinery, fertilizer plant, rocks and granites from Cross River State and goods from that axis moving up to the West. Back to a state of disrepair, the road has been a cause of serious agony for users, recording many accidents, deaths and destruction of vehicles with cries from across the region for it to be attended to.
Not even protests by Ogoni youths and women, campaigns by concerned citizens and civil society groups swayed the government enough to consider the road worthy of an emergency act. Petitions were also written by the Eleme people asking why the neglect but rather than act fast, the issue became a political game where the federal government pushed responsibility for rehabilitation of the road it feeds from, from the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs to the Federal Ministry of Works, causing more delay and more degeneration of the state of the road. Even the bridge began to cave in following the burden of an unplanned continuous heavy weight at heavy duty trucks are constantly trapped on top in the traffic build-ups that now characterize the route.
In the confused state, drivers hardly respect traffic rules as it has turned the struggle for the smartest, making travelling a reign of terror. Rather than be at strategic spots to ensure sanity, the Federal Road Safety Commission camped its officers near the Indorama gate not to control traffic, but ‘check papers’.
The disaster that erupted last Friday, was not a surprise. The Port Harcourt Eleme Rd was a disaster long waiting to happen. It capped the neglect and affirmed the disinterest of the federal government in the real wellbeing of the Niger Delta. Over 120 vehicles were burnt down and five lives lost by official record; the casualties may be more as the days go by. The sad note is that now action will begin to take place whereas, these casualties could have been saved had government diligently and duly done the needful. Had that road been in good shape, being a dual carriage road, there would have been room for escape for some of the dead and some vehicles but the bad state of the road trapped the victims, leaving a colossal damage on its trail.
Even though the federal government recently awarded a N33billion contract to work on the road, the speed of work did not show any sign of seriousness, urgency or monitoring from the Federal Ministry of Works.
National Point had consistently warned since 2022, that failure to fix this road would lead to more problems. Today we are united in mourning the dead, commiserating with the multitude of those who lost their properties and means of livelihood to the inferno in a period of great strife. This should not be our fate. The state governor, Siminilayi Fubara has already described it as a burden the state could have done without.
We call on the Works minister to call out his team and declare this road an EMERGENCY which must be very professionally and quickly executed. We call for a thorough auditing of the huge loss and implore the governor to honour his words of helping the victims count their losses while challenging our duty bearers to henceforth, think the people more rather than self. We condole with the bereaved families and pray for the repose of the souls of the dead.