The Minister of Works and Housing, Mr Babatunde Fashola on Wednesday inaugurated and handed over five roads and car park projects newly rehabilitated within the University of Lagos (UNILAG) to the management.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports the projects were part of the Federal Government’s Intervention on Internal Roads for tertiary institutions in the nation.
The inaugurated projects are Alvan Ikoku, Ablaka Tafawa Balewa road, Bunu Jike Crescent, UNILAG Shopping complex and a car park.
Fashola said President Muhammadu Buhari was committed to quality infrastructure delivery across tertiary institutions in the nation.
The minister, represented by the Federal Controller of Works in Lagos State, Mr Umar Bakare, said that government had intervened on 83 roads in tertiary institutions across the nation.
Fashola said that over 60 roads had been fully rehabilitated in different federal tertiary institutions across the country.
He said that another 18 in-campus roads were ready, while 19 others were nearing completion.
The minister said that the upgrading of road infrastructure within the tertiary institutions, was another strategic intervention of the government in supporting education through a conducive learning environment.
“The institutions are assets of the federal government,” he said.
Responding to the requests of the university community, the minister said tertiary infrastructure upgrade “is a continuous process, and not going to be a one off thing”.
In his capacity as the Federal Controller of Works, Bakare promised to personally visit the additional sites the management complained about to make a proposal for urgent intervention.
Responding, the Vice Chancellor of UNILAG, Prof. Folasade Ogunsola, hailed President Muhammadu Buhari for the initiative.
He said that the upgraded roads had made the campus more conducive for the students, lecturers, other staff and visitors.
Ogunsola solicited for more interventions in other parts of the campus, including a new road to enable the development of land spaces to augment overstretched and inadequate facilities.
She said that gullies on various stretches of roads caused a lot of hardship before the intervention and commended the quality of construction.
The vice chancellor said the future of the nation and youths would be mortgaged without investment in the education sector as being done by Buhari.
The President of Faculty of Social Sciences, UNILAG, Mr Stanley Ikechukwu, appreciated the intervention, which, according to him, had led to increase in class attendance.
Earlier, the Assistant Director of Federal Highways in Lagos State, Mrs Olukorede Keisha, an Alumna of UNILAG, thanked the Federal Ministry of Works engineers for upholding quality in the project.
She said the project would boost the morale of students and ensure commitment to academic excellence.
Keisha thanked the VC and university management for their support in actualising the project. (NAN)
