A Metropolitan Ideas’ Copy (Magazine), had a brief encounter with the Chairman, Oyo State Road Maintenance Agency, OYSROMA, Hon. Kamil Akinlabi, at his office in Jericho, Eleyele, and he gave us an insight into the agency’s activities in 2020 and some projections for 2021.
Give us an idea of some of the roads you’ve been able to embark on in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic
Thank you, in spite of the Covid-19 pandemic and the resultant effects on business activities, we were able to touch so many areas within Ibadan simply because routine maintenance is an essential part of the construction of infrastructures, so in spite of Covid-19, we devised a means so we didn’t shut down completely. It was easier for us because the traffic on the roads was less and very light. We have done a lot, it didn’t really affect us because there was a restriction of movement, making our job easier.
You were just telling us about how Covid has impacted your overall operations and this has restricted you to roads within the metropolis, the capital.
Because of the protocol established for the observance of covid-19 regulations to be obeyed by the citizens, there was no way we could extend it to other parts of the state simply because even within the state capital to a reasonable extent it was very difficult to force people to obey these protocols talk less of going to rural areas where it would have been more difficult. We didn’t want to take that chance so we limited our operation to where we think elites reside, where we think we can reasonably convince them.
Nonetheless, the inability, late arrival of our equipment, because the challenge we have is that we buy directly from the manufacturer and their covid-19 protocols are even more stringent.
But by the first quarter of 2021, we should be able to get our equipment.
In between now and then what other roads in the metropolis are you taking up?
If you take to Akobo area, we have intervened by creating alternative access roads for people while the main contractor works on the dualization from Obasanwo to Akobo Oju-irin and I think people of that area will be satisfied now and for people coming to Basorun, we have intervened in some areas there.
We are looking at critical areas we can touch before the arrival of our equipment, every month we look at another critical sector and make sure we intervene.
How do you approach these roads, is it by local government?
No, we have a dedicated line through which the populace get back to us, they call us every time there is a problem so we quickly dispatch our engineers to look at the nature of the defect and to what extent we can quickly intervene.
If the road failure does not require major structural changes we quickly go and do a kind of palliative work to make sure people can go back on the road and perform their daily activities but when we see that they are serious structural or design effects on that road what we do is provide a palliative for people to move on the road while we work through the bureaucracy to make sure we do the needful.
Lastly, the weather has been unpredictable, has this been any kind of challenge?
Like I said, in every technical area of the world today, there is evolution, so there is no way you will say natural causes adversely affect your operations because even the machines, the technique of doing the job is daily being researched upon. So today, even if rain is falling we can fix the roads and there won’t be any problem.
Against the backdrop of incessant flooding, have you had any interface with the government?
As I sit down with you, His Excellency has included me to be part of the Ibadan urban flood project so that there will be a kind of interface, so we have created a synergy.
There are some areas that you have the issue of flash flooding in the sense that the topography does not look so serious but because of adjacent drains, by the time it converges and moves straight into the main road, it comes with full force and the destruction on the path will be so devastating.
What we do is create barriers, like we did in Aare, to make sure we protect our roads and protect our people. So on the issue of flooding, we are in complete synergy with the appropriate agencies.
Next year, as an agency what plans do you have concerning road maintenance and construction?
In 2021, by the first quarter, we are determined to move to all quarters of the state simultaneously to make sure that as we are working in Ibadan, we are working in Oyo, Ogbomosho, Oke Ogun, and so on. So that by the time we are celebrating our third year anniversary we should be able to stand before our people and tell them one or two stories from every part of the state.
What is it you said about the phone line?
We have a dedicated line but we urge our people to always text instead of calling so that we have records of their complaints where they will describe the location appropriately, if possible they can even include the phone number of the contact person that our engineers will reach out to when they get to the location.
The number is 081 6786 2742, for SMS alone, our line is open 24 hours daily.
