AFTER several concerns raised by Nigerians over the Lagos – Calabar coastal road, the Federal Government has backtracked on the project despite demolishing Landmark Beach Resort and other businesses estimated at over $200 million around the project take-off point in Lagos State.

The government had to backtrack on its initial plan of commencing the project from the Lagos axis because of criticisms trailing the demolition of investments already blossoming across the corridor and environmental impact assessment raised by stakeholders about the project.

The backtracking  followed remarks by the Minister of Works, David Umahi, at a meeting with some stakeholders in Lagos on Thursday, May 23.

Umahi announced the commencement of construction on section three of the highway, starting from Calabar in Cross Rivers State, and section four from Akwa Ibom, pending the completion of the procurement process.

Apart from environmental impact assessment concerns, the project raised several dusts for violating open competitive bidding and the government’s failure to publish bidders at the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) portal before the commencement.

Already, the management of Landmark Beach said it is seeking compensation from the Federal Government over the demolition of its properties estimated at $200 million.

In a statement signed by the management of Landmark Group, the company noted that the demolished properties included supporting buildings and infrastructure to the Landmark ecosystem.

The statement also disclosed that the demolition resulted in the loss of nearly half of the company’s revenue.

The ICIR reported on Saturday, April 27, that while kicking off the project, the Ministry of Works carried out some demolition exercises on several beach areas in Lagos State, including the Landmark Beach Resort.

The coastal highway is a 700-kilometre project estimated to cost N15 trillion and to be built by Hitech Construction Company, owned by Gilbert Chargoury, a long-term associate of President Bola Tinubu.

The government is pushing through the construction of the coastal highway to link the South-West of the country to the Niger Delta (South-South).

However, the project has generated heated debates as Nigerians question the importance of the road when the country is experiencing the worst economic crisis in decades.

The presidential candidate of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) in Nigeria’s 2023 general elections, Atiku Abubakar, his counterpart in the Labour Party, Peter Obi, and other stakeholders have raised issues with procurement violations and sudden attention shift to the N15 trillion project, albeit when the nation is littered with abandoned federal roads across the country.

Atiku had sarcastically said, among others, that, “Because the project did not require public funds, it did not go through approval from the National Assembly, which holds the power of appropriation. Also, the project only went through the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission with no record of competitive bidding since Chargoury’s firm was to fund the project 100%.”

Obi also stated, “Contrary to reason and the necessity for compassion in public policy, the federal government has commenced the controversial Lagos-Calabar coastal highway project. Our economy is struggling, and our health institutions are ill-equipped. Why embark on an expensive new highway project when there are close to 50 abandoned federal highway projects across the country?

On April 29, 2024, demolition activities commenced at Oniru Beach in Victoria Island, Lagos and extended to Landmark Beach Resort, The Good Beach, and Sol Beach, all within a 1.4-kilometre stretch due to their encroachment on the right-of-way designated for the highway.

At the meeting with stakeholders on Thursday, the minister remarked that the federal government had shelved the project in Lagos State while saving the telecommunications infrastructure and submarine cables, among others at the axis.

The ICIR reports that with the suspension, Telcos, MTN submarine cables, and workstations along the Okun-Ajah community axis may have been saved from demolition after a thorough assessment of the EIA impact on infrastructure and business activities along the Okun-Ajah community axis.

Umahi addressed the stakeholders on ‘Compensation and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)’ on the project and informed community groups and traditional institutions in the state, particularly the Okun-Ajah community in Lagos that the project would be suspended.

The Okun-Ajah community had cried out and warned the Federal and Lagos State governments over the alleged illegal variation to the highway route which put six villages at risk of demolition and displace three traditional kingdoms within the area alone.

Umahi buttressed the need to redesign the route to save the 600 years of the ancestry of the Okun-Ajah community, adding that, the President, out of compassion to realign the project, added a human phase to save the properties and infrastructures on the Okun-Ajah axis.

The minister said following the gazetted alignment, and order of the EIA assessment, over 750 houses were expected to be demolished in the old alignment while 450 houses were marked for demolition in the new alignment after a thorough assessment of the project along the Okun-Ajah community axis.

Umahi also explained that the project approval followed due process and went through the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) after consideration by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) as prescribed by law.

He added that BPP issued a certificate of no objection on the project to the Ministry of Works in line with the Procurement Act but added that the Ministry of Works took the certificate of no objection to FEC and the FEC debated and approved it.

Commenting further on the development, a social critique and the chairman of Stanbic IBTC Holdings, Atedo Peterside said demolition before proper environmental impact assessment of the buildings was a major concern.

“This is precisely why a proper environmental impact assessment (EIA) should have been carried out, plus some sort of public hearing that would have given affected persons a voice. Unless I am mistaken, it appears that FG has destroyed properties along a new chosen path of the new Lagos-Calabar coastal road only to realise now that sticking to the original path (as argued by @landmarkafrica and others) makes so much more sense.

“I sincerely hope that I am wrong, but please let us take EIA seriously in future,” Peterside said on his X account.