Senate Advises FG On Concession Of Eleme-Onne Road

The Senate Committee on Trade and Investment has advised the Federal Government to give out the Eleme-Onne Road in Rivers State to a private investor for reconstruction and management, describing the washed-out road as a key transport channel for the nation’s economy.
Speaking at an oversight visit at the Oil and Gas Free Zone in Onne, Chairman of the committee, Senator Francis Fadahunsi, decried the deplorable state of the road.
He said that the lone access road to the oil and gas industrial hub in the Eleme-Onne axis of Rivers State needed to be urgently saved from total disrepair in order to prevent adverse impact on industries located in the area, adding that could lead to a massive loss of jobs and revenue to the government.
The Eleme-Onne Road is part of the East-West Road network and serves as the only access to the Port Harcourt Refineries at Eleme; the Onne Port Complex; the nation’s flagship Oil and Gas Free Zone at Onne; the Indorama-Eleme Petrochemicals Company, which is the nation’s leading fertilizer producer and exporter; as well as the Notore Industries Limited, another fertilizer producer and promoter of the Notore Industrial City (a free zone).
The committee, however, commended progress at the free zone after a tour of facilities at the special economic hub and presentations by the free zone regulator, the Oil and Gas Free Zone Authority (OGFZA), as well as free zone operators which included Intels Nigeria Limited and FMCEquip, makers of equipment for deep sea oil drilling.