TheCable

The federal executive council (FEC) has approved a reimbursement of N9.6 billion to Plateau and Borno states governments for road projects executed on behalf of the federal government.

The council gave the approval on Wednesday at a meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari.

Speaking to journalists at the end of the meeting, Babatunde Fashola, minister of works and housing, said the refunds were necessary.

“We presented two policy memoranda. The first was for a refund to two state governments for previous interventions on federal government roads subject to the July 2016 cut-off after which refunds will no longer be eligible,” he said.

“The two states which had outstanding with respect to eligible roads are Plateau and Borno states. Council approved the refund of N6, 601,769,470,99 in favour of Plateau state and the sum of N3,084,797,113.34 for Borno state.”

Fashola also said the council approved a memorandum that informed it about the commencement of a procurement process for a central clearing house for the operations of toll plaza concessionaires.

He said this was in line with the current administration’s decision to resuscitate tolling across the country.

“This approval will give room for a private sector operator to build a central clearing house at its own expense, operate it, recover, and then ultimately transfer back to the government,” the minister said.

“What the central clearing house will do is to synchronise interoperability between different toll systems that may be used by different concessionaires when they commence their tolls and also provide a one-stop accounting system and a single payment recovery system where everybody is paid at the end of the operations as well as provide visibility for government to see what is going on in the operations of each concessionaire.”

On his part, Niyi Adebayo, minister of industry, trade, and investment, said the council approved a N1.8billion contract for the construction of a package sewage system for the authority’s head office within the liberty free zone in Akwa Ibom state.

“My ministry brought a memo on behalf of the oil and gas free zones authority, which is a parastatal under our ministry, as part of its responsibility of regulating and attracting foreign direct investments into the country is supervising certain oil and gas free zones in the country and one of which is the liberty free zone in Ikot Abasi, Akwa Ibom,” he said.

“To this end, they sought the council’s approval for the award of a contract for the construction of a package sewage system for the authorities’ head office within the liberty free zone in Akwa Ibom state, in the sum of N1,803,556,537.95, inclusive of 7.5 percent value-added tax (VAT), with the completion period of 10 months, without variation, and counsel graciously approved the award of the contract.”