Under the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) Tax Credit Scheme, the Federal Executive Council allocated N1.535 trillion for the building and repair of eleven highways around the nation.
The money, according to Babatunde Fashola, minister of works and housing, would be used to build nearly 700km of important highways in Nigeria.
The highways, which Fashola claimed would soon be finished, will connect 11 states.
He highlighted the states that will benefit, among them Edo, Delta, Kano, Kaduna, Borno, and Adamawa.
“The Council gave approval for the construction and rehabilitation of 11 roads totaling 737.242 kilometers in the sum of N1, 535, 154, 247, 234.48 under phase II of the NNPC tax credit scheme.
“Recall that in January this year, the council approved a memo for the NNPC to invest N1.9 trillion on our roads. That amount was then about 44 roads that had been awarded and the balance of those roads that had to go through procurement between then and now are the 11 that have now been approved by the council,” he said.
Senator Shehu Sani, a former legislator and social critic in Nigeria, asserted that President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration is borrowing more money, raising pay, and hiring more people as its term comes to an end.
Additionally, Sani said that government contracts are being awarded in the billions while contractors are still owing money, calling them “traps in the guise of niceties.”
The statement is contained in a post via his verified Twitter handle on Thursday.