Skip to main content

Planning works start for a second Niger Bridge

The Federal Government of Nigeria gave the go-ahead for work to start on the planning and design of a new Niger bridge. The country’s leaders have approved a US$2 million (Nigerian Naira N325 million) “transactional advisory services” contract to assess how to design and build, finance and operate a “Second Niger Bridge.” Contractor Roughton International Limited has been given 16 months to come back with a detailed schedule of how to progress.
August 17, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
The Federal Government of Nigeria gave the go-ahead for work to start on the planning and design of a new Niger bridge.

The country’s leaders have approved a US$2 million (Nigerian Naira N325 million) “transactional advisory services” contract to assess how to design and build, finance and operate a “Second Niger Bridge.” Contractor 6395 Roughton International Limited has been given 16 months to come back with a detailed schedule of how to progress.

At the same meeting, the Nigerian government also gave Roughton International the green light on a $1.9 million (N297 million) consultancy contract for a new road into Lagos’ Murtala Mohammed International Airport.

The “Second Niger Bridge” project is likely to be built using a public-private partnership arrangement said the country’s minister of works, Mike Onolememen, at the end of this week’s weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting chaired by president Goodluck Jonathan. The minister told local reporters that he “expected” that “ground-breaking” work would “start by the third quarter of 2013.”

According to Onolememen, “the Federal Government” is keen to “address Nigeria’s infrastructure deficit and improve the quality of public infrastructure services.” The public-private approach will be used to speed up this process he said, and the country will exploit “private sector investment” opportunities in order “to complement the drive towards bridging the country’s enormous infrastructure gap.”

“In view of this,” he added, “the Second Niger Bridge - which is a critical national infrastructure project – will form an essential link between the south west and south east (of Nigeria) and connect the cities of Onitsha and Asaba.”

The government has also decided to act on the Murtala Mohammed International Airport Road plan because the current highway is in a “deplorable condition” and it wants to create a new and much more impressive “gateway to Nigeria and Lagos.”

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Aecon pulls out of Canada-US Gordie Howe Bridge project
    May 8, 2018
    Canadian construction company Aecon has withdrawn from a private group competing to construct and operate the Gordie Howe International Bridge between Canada and the US. Aecon’s departure comes only weeks before the Canadian government plans to announce the winning group. Construction of the bridge - costing more than US$3.7 billion and between Windsor in Canada’s Ontario province and Detroit in the US state of Michigan - is scheduled to start in the autumn 2018. Aecon’s chief executive reportedly denied
  • US$84.3 million Niger road surfacing works
    September 24, 2024
    Niger road surfacing works worth US$84.3 million are planned.
  • South East Nigeria’s new dual carriageway planned
    September 21, 2015
    A new dual carriageway is planned for Nigeria’s Cross River State, in the South East of the country. The dual carriageway will connect the city of Calabar in the south of the state with Obudu in the north of the state. The project has had its official ground breaking ceremony carried out by the country’s president, Muhammadu Buhari. The dual carriageway will stretch around 260km in all according to reports in the Nigerian press. This new dual carriageway will help cut journey times as the condition of the e
  • Modern road system is 'a must'
    August 2, 2012
    Australia's GDP could see a major increase if traffic bottlenecks in big cities were to be removed, and the government is addressing this as a matter of urgency A modern road system is a must in Australia where it is estimated that the removal of traffic bottlenecks could potentially raise the country's GDP by 0.8%. According to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA), which made the prediction, infrastructure bottlenecks (particularly in cities, which account for over 70% of the country'