RAYMOND OZOJI reports
Citizens of Ihiala Local Government Area of Anambra State have drawn attention to the perilous and very devastating Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road, describing it as a mortuary because of the fatalities recorded on the road.
The very terrible nature of the road has compelled vehicles and motorcycles to navigate bush paths to access their destinations thereby exposing them to dangers of kidnappings, armed-robbery attacks and other criminal likelihoods.
Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road is said to be very strategic and only major road linking so many communities and also connected Ezego road, Okija and the ever busy Onitsha-Owerri federal highway.
The road which is the only available access road to farmers from remote villages to convey their farm produce to Onitsha and other parts of the state, is now a shadow of itself because it is no longer useful to the people due to its level of dilapidation and decay coupled with the sad reality that vehicles are being submerged in gigantic potholes filled with flood waters constituting mini-erosion sites on the ill-fated Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road in Ihiala Local Government Area of the state.
A community dweller noted that the road had claimed several lives; had some of its victims hospitalised as well as destroyed many vehicles beyond repairs.
The community dweller maintained that in spite of efforts by an organization called Ihekamba Foundation and some other public-spirited individuals who usually carried out palliative works on the road, the road, according to him, is more than a nightmare now as it requires a more capital intensive approach to tackle which he believes only government can undertake.
Another community dweller Mr. Herbert Nwabaso who hails from Umuike Ubahuekwem told this journalist that the deplorable conditions of the Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road has posed unimaginable hardships on the people because they no longer access the major road instead they use bush paths to go to their houses which often took longer time and risky.
Nwabaso also disclosed that whenever it rained, flood from the ill-fated road flowed freely into houses and shops along the road thereby forcing people to flee from their homes and shops for safety. He maintained that the Umudara axis of the road is completely impassible as villagers now risked their lives using bush paths to find their ways out of the quagmire.
According to him, people now turn down invitations to burial ceremonies and other social gatherings in Ubahuekwem and other communities connected by the Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road due to its very deplorable condition and that the fear of being kidnapped or robbed has forced people to decline attempting to use bush paths.
Mr. Nwabaso emphasized that there is no single road in Ihiala. That Bank road behind Total Petrol Station Ihiala is another eyesore; wondering what representatives from Ihiala have done to attract attention of the state government to the plights of roads in the area even as he claimed that Soludo's administration has not constructed one road in Ihiala.
Mr. Victor Ikechukwu Odigbo, who also hails from Umuike Ubahuekwem Ihiala, confirmed to this journalist that Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road is worse than a mortuary now. Odigbo said that the road is terribly bad such that people now see bush paths as veritable alternative to the already dead major road.
Meanwhile former President-General of Ihiala Progress Union (IPU) Barr. Okey Ohagba, who is also a native of Ubahuekwem community, recalled that his administration drew the attention of government to the sorry state of Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road and some other roads but all to no avail.
Ohagba also observed that the abandoned nature of Ndi-Ezike-Umudara road will impact negatively on the Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road because the flood from the abandoned road project which he said has claimed lives will settle at the Umudara axis of the road thereby causing the situation to be more catastrophic.
The former PG however appealed to the state government to come to the aid of Ihiala people by fixing Uzoigwe-Ubahuekwem-Umudara road and other roads requiring urgent attention because the people are really suffering the blight from bad roads in the area.
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