By Abdulrahman Abdulraheem
The Federal Executive Council on Wednesday approved the development of greenfield port facilities in Badagry, Lagos State.
Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola made this announcement while briefing State House correspondents after a meeting of the Federal Executive Council.
According to Fashola, work on the port started in 2012 but the development of the faculties was delayed due to the refusal of the immediate past administration to approve it.
“This is consistent with what this government stands for in terms of allowing private capital and competence to come into the development of our infrastructure.”
There are bigger vessels now being built across the world that require larger depths and drafts berth. Now, some of our competitors on the continent are building bigger ports. So, if we don’t build this port, we risk becoming uncompetitive and we risk a threat to our maritime hub status,” the minister said.
Also speaking at the briefing, Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amaechi said the Federal Government expected the concessional agreement on the port facilities to take five years to construct.
“In this period when we are looking for foreign exchange, it is going to bring a total of $2.558bn into the system, and the Federal Government and the Lagos State Government will not contribute financially other than the land given by the Lagos State Government,” he said.
