Bi-Courtney’s Ogun Misadventure

The company had gone to town alleging that the Ogun State Governor, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, led a detachment of anti-riot policemen to the site of the asphalt plant the firm erected to facilitate repairs of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway, threatening to pull down the structure. In a statement from Bi-Courtney’s spokesman, Dipo Kehinde, the firm had […]

The company had gone to town alleging that the Ogun State Governor, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, led a detachment of anti-riot policemen to the site of the asphalt plant the firm erected to facilitate repairs of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway, threatening to pull down the structure.

In a statement from Bi-Courtney’s spokesman, Dipo Kehinde, the firm had alleged that the governor threatened, “to dismantle a $6.5 million (about N1 billion) asphalt plant the company bought” for the repair of the expressway.

He added, “but for the resistance put up by the Chief Security Officer of the concessionaire, Colonel Adeola Olabiyi (rtd) and his team, the governor would have pulled down the multi-million naira structure.”

Bi-Courtney who won the concessioning project from the federal government some two years ago, added, “since the grant of the concession, Ogun State Government was taken as a major partner, given that 80 per cent of the highway falls within the state. Ogun State was to give us land as its own contribution to the project. The former RCC yard was identified, visited and allocated to us by the Ogun State government. The process entailed a joint visit and assessment before allocation, following all due process.

“To buttress this fact, we duly settled the land owners promptly, to demonstrate our commitment to the site. The payment to the landowners was done after due consultations with the state government and confirmation of the landowners at a joint stakeholders meeting with officials of the Bureau of Land. The state government actually brokered the meeting with the family land owners. A search was also conducted at the Ogun State Survey Directorate, and the search report revealed that the property is unencumbered,” maintained Bi-Courtney’s spokesman.

Shocked by the barefaced falsehood which was further amplified by the publication of a photograph of the purported asphalt plant by Compass newspaper, the state government conducted media men to the disputed site

to allow them ascertain the truth. The media men were however shocked to the marrow, to discover that no construction work is going on at the site, talkless of anyone dismantling any plant.

Only three containers were deposited on the bushy site together with a disused shed used by the former occupants, Reynolds Construction Company (RCC). The shocked mediamen confronted Kehinde who was also on ground, apparently after being tipped off about the media visit. The firm’s image-maker was all nerves as he suddenly became incoherent and jittery.

The state commissioner for Works and Infrastructure, Arc Lekan Adegbite, told reporters at the controversial site at the Sagamu interchange on the highway, that Bi-Courtney was spreading falsehood.The commissioner accused the firm of misleading the public and engaging in face-saving tactics to mask its failure to begin work on the road two years after it got the concession.

Bi-Courtney Highway Services had been franchised by the Federal Government two years ago to source for N89,533 billion to redevelop the 120

-kilometre road and recoup its investment over a 25-year period. But nothing has happened since the deal was signed. Rather, the road had developed into another death trap in Nigeria. It is the poor position of the road that prompted the Minister of Works, Mr. Mike Onolememen, to hand the firm a six-week ultimatum to complete the road or forfeit the deal.

Arc.Adegbite who marvelled at the level of falsehood fed the public by the firm, added that it was he and not the governor who visited the site on “Sunday with anti-riot policemen to secure the place” and wondered why Bi-Courtney official could not differentiate between a commissioner and a state governor.

“We did not demolish anything here. We are all for this road, 80 per cent of the road lies in Ogun state, so we will like to partner with Bi-Courtney to fix the road. So if Bi-Courtney does what is proper, that is, approach the government for land, of course we will allocate land to them but they need to do what is needful and we would definitely oblige them,” Adegbite added.

The commissioner, flanked by his counter-part in Information and Strategy ministry, Alhaji Yusuph Olaniyonu, further told the newsmen, “the state government needed the abandoned RCC site to solve the menace by tanker drivers plying the expressway”. He explained that the government settled for the site because of its position as an interchange that is accessible to trucks coming from both the Northern and the Eastern parts of the country.

Arc. Adegbite who threw a challenge at the firm to come out with documents of land acquisition from the Ogun state government, revealed that Bi-Courtney was given six weeks from April 14 to pay N75 million on the land and write a letter of acceptance. He alleged that the company has so far failed to comply.

He said: “It was stated in the letter that if they accept this offer, they should write a letter of acceptance, and Bi-Courtney neither wrote a letter nor paid the money within the stipulated time and that automatically meant that they had rejected the offer. In the letter (from the state government to Bi-Courtney), it was expressly stated that if the conditions stated are right by them, the sum of money to be paid amounted to N75 million. It was stated in the letter that if they accept this offer, they should write a letter of acceptance, and Bi-Courtney neither wrote a  letter nor paid the money and what that told me is that the land was never allocated to the company”.

Sensing that the lid had been blown off its lies, the chairman of the firm,Dr Wale Babalakin,while commenting on the faceoff on Channels Television, abandoned the falsehood initially sent out by the company. He affirmed that the company was yet to erect any plant at the site.

He also absolved his organisation of any blame in connection with the picture published by the newspaper, which he claimed was only a model of the proposed plant.

But why should a supposedly reputable company set out to deceive the public? The reason seems not farfetched. The sixty-day ultimatum from the

federal Government could be the fillip if it is to avert the impending hammer from the central governments over its incompetence in highway management.

Olusola Balogun is a media aide of Governor Ibikunle Amosun. He can be reached through [email protected]