Anambra Information Commissioner Urges Residents To Protect Public Infrastructure, Social Amenities… 

Anambra Commissioner for Information, Sir Paul Nwosu has called on Anambra residents to make required commitment towards sustenance of newly constructed roads in the state.

In a released statement, the Commissioner states that the recent survey by the Ministry of Works on causes of roads failure clearly shows that it is largely in the hands of the public to stop the roads form failing.

He stated that the policy is gradually shifting from the days when people believe that government’s property is nobody’s property, as this has become out of tune with an evolving tax driven economy such as Anambra where those who pay taxes and legitimate levies are stakeholders in the system which means that everybody has a sacred duty to protect government assets because everybody contributed to building and emplacing them.

Sir Paul noted that when people pay for the road, the public facilities and utilities which were provided with their money, then they have a responsibility to protect them just like the property in their private homes adding that when government is compelled to rebuild, replace or repair these facilities before they are due, the public is denying themselves of other new infrastructure and amenities that government would have provided for them with their tax money.

The Information Commissioner stated that governor Chukwuma Soludo has repeatedly sworn that he will account for the last Kobo paid to his government by way of taxes and levies and he has continued to make-good this pledge by the quality of infrastructures that are coming up in addition to roads that will unprecedentedly last a minimum of twenty years.

He noted that it depends on how well the residents take ownership and care for them as a people.

He urged the residents to put a stop to indiscriminate refuse disposal that always end up blocking drains and culverts thereby causing run-off water and ponding on the road pavement.

Sir Paul stated that sundry economic activities on the pavements such as car wash services, water vending, trading of perishable items on the pavement, offloading of heavy machine parts and goods, and the burning of tyres and other materials on the roads and pavements cause water infiltration into the pavements, leading to the deformation of the roads and eventual failure, adding that repetitive heavy traffic loads when the roads are not designed for such axial loads is one of the causes of tearing and wearing as well as resultant road failure.