By Sanni Onogu

The Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA) on Tuesday said it had proposed N55.5 billion for maintenance of roads across the country.

Its Managing Director, Nurudeen Rafindadi, announced this when he appeared before the Senate Committee on FERMA, chaired by Gershon Bassey, to defend the agency’s 2021 budget estimates.

Speaking about FERMA’s 2021 budget estimates, Rafindadi said N38.2 billion was proposed for capital expenditure; N17.3 billion for recurrent expenditure; N14.9 billion for overhead and N2.3 billion for personnel cost.

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When asked to present details of the projects being executed by FERMA on a state-by-state basis, Rafindadi said he would make the list available to the committee at a later date.

He said: “We will bring the breakdown of projects being executed, state-by-state, as soon as possible and the amount earmarked for the projects across the country.”

On how many roads the agency will fix in 2021, the FERMA MD said: “We cannot project right now.  We have N21 billion available to tackle emergency road projects which is yet to be deployed yet.

“We prioritise emergency jobs based on ministerial prioritisation for roads. We prioritise critical economic routes: roads to refineries and depots, roads through agriculture areas, among others.