Maduka Nweke
Alhaji Aliko Dangote does not need any introduction especially in the Nigerian business world. A former President of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), Dangote sits as Chairman of many quoted and non quoted companies in Nigeria. He serves as the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President of Dangote Industries Limited. He successfully transformed a small trading business, which he began in 1977 to a multibillion naira enterprise. Recently, he spareheaded the construction of the Apapa Road where he partnered the likes of Flour Mills of Nigeria (FMN) and Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA). In this interview with Daily Sun, Dangote informed the public that the road, which his company is handling, would be the strongest road network in Nigeria. According to him, the construction is part of the company’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) even though it is a PPP with no cost. He fielded other questions on and about Apapa Road and its environs.
Excerpts:
Apapa scenario
I think my impression has totally changed because I can see that there is great hope. AG Dangote is actually doing an excellent job. You know this our road is funded by Dangote, Flour Mills and NPA. You can see the quality of the road is really very impressive and I am impressed because I thought we are doing just a normal road. Even in Germany, you cannot see this kind of road. This road will last at least a minimum of three generations. I am talking of over 60 years. It is so solid you can check anywhere; it can hold any traffic and they are doing a great job. You can look at the quality of job they are doing. It is not only doing the job but the quality of job so that we do not leave here and after two or three years, contractors will have to come back.
I can assure you, once we leave this job, none of us here alive will see the end of this road. That is how solid the road is going to be. They had challenges in the past because of the gas pipelines that were laid under and some electrical appliances, which now lately the military’s engineers, led by one of their senior engineers here, have solved. They have done something very creative. Now they have moved a lot of those pipes away and this has actually given us time.
We are now going to double our efforts to make sure we work day and night so that this road will be delivered latest by end of June. By end of June, this traffic here will be off but then we are now really pleading with the government to move all these task forces all over the place and just leave police, LASTMA and FRSC. These are the only three we need. We are going to write formerly to government to please help us remove all these task forces especially the Federal Units of Customs. If they want to set a checkpoint or roadblock, I think this is the wrong place to come and set up a roadblock. The issue is that people don’t really understand how much money we are losing. If you quantify it in billions, it is 20 times the cost of this road every single day. So we need to make sure that we decongest this area and you can see the dangerous thing happening there. You can see that trucks are now static on the bridge. This is supposed to be a passing weight and not static weight. So, I think we actually have to check the stability and the credibility of the bridges. This is because they have overloaded them and I am a little bit worried about them.
Mile 2 axis
If you look at it, we have done a lot of palliatives and majority of the palliatives will be done in the next one month or so. We will finish the palliative but that is not the permanent solution. We have already agreed with government that the same quality you see here you will end up seeing there. And I think if we give ourselves may be one year from now, you will see how hard government has worked to make sure that from now all this mess is out of here. It has dragged on for long but at least, we are on it today.
Security
Well, if you look around Tin Can Island, I have not been there but if you go, I have seen the picture. There is a trailer park of almost 380 or so trucks and that will help in a way to decongest the traffic. I think that based on the last meeting we held, I was told that the trailer park will soon be ready as we are finishing the road palliative. I am now sure that if you go through Liverpool Road, you will see the great difference. So it is not that the government is sleeping and not doing anything. No, they are doing quite a lot but there are challenges all over the place.
Weigh bridges
Well, we already have weigh bridges and as far as I know, when I used to go to the port about 15 years ago, we had weigh bridge right in front of the gate. So the weigh bridges are for the management of traffic because if you look at the weigh bridge, it does not make any commercial sense. After Customs checks your goods and they are through with you, then another Ikeja territorial unit is mounting a checkpoint. If there is a checkpoint even on our roads where you don’t have traffic, once you mount a checkpoint, you start creating traffic. Even in Victoria Island now, if there is checkpoint, there will be traffic. That is why they dismantled some of the police checkpoints. But Customs shouldn’t come here and be mounting a checkpoint. Their checkpoint should be somewhere at may be the tollgate. Even if they do it anywhere, they create traffic. And right now if you look, this road has been in existence since I don’t know. But as far as I know and I am concerned, it has been in existence before 1978 because I came to Lagos in 1978 and this same road has been there. You can see the population. Most of the population in Nigeria, about 70 per cent, were not born in 1978.
PPP arrangement
Well, we try to do our possible best by making some contributions because if we and Flour Mills, that is, Dangote and Flour Mills, if we had not actually taken the initiative, this road would have been like this for more years to come and everybody is losing money. Even if all of us can afford to lose money, the smaller businesses wouldn’t be able to go through all these. You know, if you have one container now and the container is tucked in the port for days, you will be charged demurrage and you pay high fees. At the end of the day, when you settle and clear your goods, you will not be even able to pay your loans. So this is why I think we need to do that. Government cannot do everything but we need to also do our own bit.
interventions by Dangote, Flour Mills
This particular one is a different Public Private Partnership (PPP). This one is a PPP with no cost. CSR is Corporate Social Responsibility but I think that PPP all over the world is excellent so that governments can take off their hands and concentrate on delivery of health, defense and other areas but infrastructure. It is difficult for any government to fund infrastructure and also fund the daily needs of the population. But I think that the current government has embraced PPP. They are coming out with very good model like the road. I am sure it will be a different one in the next two years.
Delivery time
We will surprise you because for the first time, a contractor will deliver the road at least on schedule or before schedule.
Commitment
The ratio of commitment is, since the entire road is costing about N4.3 billion and I think NPA is giving about N1.8 billion. The rest of the money which is N2.6 billion is going to be given free of charge both by Flour Mills of Nigeria and Dangote. But I must also caution that the cost of the road is not open because we got our own construction company to do it at cost. So that is the difference. We are doing it also at cost. So there are three donations. The construction company is building at cost and you can go and ask anybody. After we have finished the road, you can bring Julius Berger and other construction companies. When they cost the road, you see they will double the price.