- By Halimah Olamide
We are happy; the contractors are meeting up, and all the promises made they have fulfilled
President Bola Tinubu has approved May 27 to June 6 as Federal Capital Territory Week for the inauguration of various projects executed under his administration.
The Minister of FCT, Mr Nyesom Wike, stated this while inspecting some of the projects in preparation for inauguration to celebrate Tinubu’s one year in office.
“By the approval of Mr President, we believe that from May 27, we shall begin the inauguration of various projects and will end on June 6.
“Particularly on May 27, President Tinubu will inaugurate commercial operations of the Abuja Light Rail also known as Abuja Metro Line, and we will carry out the final inspection of the project on May 20.
“From what we have seen, I think we are good to go,” he said.
Wike also expressed confidence that the Vice-President’s residence, located along Aso Drive, would be completed and may be inaugurated on June 6.
He explained that the 9-day inauguration activities would demonstrate to the world the Tinubu-led administration’s determination to renew the hope of Nigerians.
He added: “We have a lot of projects being executed that will be inaugurated. So many projects that I cannot begin to list them.
“We are happy; the contractors are meeting up, and all the promises made they have fulfilled.
“We have also fulfilled our own part, by making sure that we make the needed cash available and none of the contractors is complaining in terms of cash.”
The minister added that other projects like the construction of bus terminals and the FCT Court of Appeal Division and other projects would be inaugurated within the period.
On the non-functionality of some of the streetlights in parts of the city, Wike explained that some of the streetlights were being worked on, while others were being tested.
He assured the residents that the streetlights would come on once the contractors finished working on them,
“As I speak to you, most of the streetlights are being worked on and with the project we are executing, you don’t expect the light to be on.
“The contractors are test running them, so most of the ones that are not working are those that are being worked on.
“We believe that before the inauguration you will see that most of the streetlights will be on,” the minister said.
When asked whether he was being distracted by the development in Rivers, Wike simply said: “I am not distracted. If I am distracted you won’t see this performance.
“I focus on my work. So, I am not interested. I am the Minister of FCT, and work is going on, why will I be distracted? I don’t even think about it at all.”