BY DAYO JOHNSON
AKURE— DISTURBED by the spate of auto crashes occasioned by failed portions of Federal roads in Ondo State, the state government has commenced the rehabilitation of the bad portions of the Ilesha/ Owo/Benin expressway.

Thirty four persons died on the road last week following attempt by one of the drivers of the buses to overtake the other which made him ram into an oncoming trailer.

This was contained in a statement by the Chief Press Secretary to the governor Kolawole Olabisi in Akure.

He said that the Commissioner of Works and Infrastructural Maintenance, Gboye Adegbenro, who is supervising the rehabilitation of the road decried the insensitivity of the Federal authorities to road maintenance to avoid the perennial wanton loss of lives on our roads.

The Commissioner said that unless concrete actions were urgently taken by the Federal Government to fix its bad roads, the heavy traffic build up on the roads especially during the coming Yuletide may result into more road disasters.

“I was told that the contract for this road has been awarded to a contractor for sometime now, up till now nothing had been done till this incident occurred.

“Recently we pleaded with the Federal Government to pay attention to the Ore Sagamu-Benin road when people were complaining of the terrible situation, though they called us names, yet they promised of fixing the road. It has been an issue for sometime now.

“Look at what happened now on another federal highway. FERMA should be more responsible and responsive to its functions and duties; they should also clear the road shoulders.”

On the reimbursement being owed the State by the Federal Government on roads rehabilitated on its behalf, the Commissioner said “for every road repair done by state government on behalf of the Federal Government, the state is supposed to be reimbursed, but payment used to be a difficult issue.

“We have worked for them, we have written them, recently after visiting the minister in charge, issue of who owes who, how much do they owe came up, Abuja sent a delegation here and we checked our records to determine the way forward. The issue is being tackled now”