Fides Media Living the Faith
For a long time now, the Immigration Junction in Awka has remained a slaughter house where many human lives have been lost in circumstances that would have been avoided by the government doing simple things.
There is indeed no week that one or more accidents are not recorded at that place that has become a cauldron of death. The Immigration Junction is located somewhere at Agu Awka at a place also called Ezeuzu Junction. A slope from the Aroma End of the road terminates at that junction where vehicles coming down the slope are suddenly forced to veer left to connect to a single lane coming from the Enugu end of the road. This is because the straight road from the slope after the junction is not in good condition and thus, not motorable.
Thus, drivers coming down the slope who are not conversant with the layout of that road suddenly find they cannot continue on the straight road, and in most cases, in an attempt to brake or slow down, they lose control of their vehicles and ram into other vehicles there. This is usually the case with drivers of articulated vehicles.
A recent accident there involved a vehicle which rammed into a commercial tricycle which impact threw out a passenger who was crushed to death by an approaching trailer.
Another contributory factor to the frequent accidents there is the bad nature of the portion of road at that junction. Although the Anambra State Government had tried in the past and also recently to patch up the road, it has kept deteriorating and thus, endangering the lives of those who use the road.
Owing to the alarming number of fatal accidents at that spot, one would have expected the federal and state governments to come up with an enduring plan to stop the carnage.
The road in question is a federal road and thus ought to have been receiving the attention of the federal government. Rather than do that, the federal government has failed to continue the construction of the road on the right that leads to Enugu State, thus confusing drivers not conversant with the road.
But we feel that the state government should not wait endlessly for the federal government to do its work on the road, being that the road in question is used by the people of Anamba State. We have had occasions where the state government in the past did some federal roads and was refunded later. The road at Immigration Junction needs such an intervention from the Anambra State Government to fine tune that junction after which the federal government should refund them.
Anything being done should really be done fast before the rains intensify. That nothing permanent has been done there all this while to avoid the accidents happening there does not portray the federal and state governments in good light. It is therefore time to wake up and make amends.