STOP THE VANDALISM AND DESTRUCTION OF NIGERIA’s CRITICAL INFRASTRUCTURE
By Dr. Joel Ademisoye, United States
This isn’t ethnocentrism, ethnic politics or ethnic discrimination against the Igbos in Nigeria, but just plain truth, imagine that the Federal Minister of Works, David Nweze Umahi has threatened to resign from the President Tinubu administration, over the continued vandalism and destruction of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway, which is still under construction and it is the most expensive road project, at whopping costs of N15 Trillion (or $11 to $13 billion) in the Nigerian history. Yet, these scavengers who are in business of the discarded iron and metal materials are deliberately dismantling and removing the manhole covers used for the drainage system and taking them to the market for sale. What an unpatriotic disservice, destructive tendency and damage to the Nigeria’s critical infrastructure in the country, which is costing the FGN, a huge replacement costs. For this writer, it is an appalling destructive tendency, selfish economic and financial interests of the scavengers, who take the interest in dismantling the parts or materials of these important infrastructure to the national development and taking them to the market for sale. You may recall that a similar vandalism, destruction and thievery of the manhole covers on the roads took place in the nation’s capital of Abuja last year in 2025. The scanvegers of a particular ethnic extraction in Nigeria were identified, arrested and apprehended in the Abuja market with all the manhole covers for sale in the marketplace. This particular ethnic group is dominated the scavengers business of searching and recovering the iron and metal scraps, are the ones vandalizing and destroying the Nigeria’s critical infrastructure, such as the dismantling and destroying the bridge railings of the Second River Niger Bridge and the rehabilitated railway tracks across the country. Imagine the replacement costs of the damaged structural irons and metals are prohibitive to the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN).
Consequently, I have suggested and recommended in my writing, that the FGN needs a paradigm shift in protecting and securing the country’s critical infrastructure such as the roads, highways, railway lines, bridges, electricity cables and transformers among others, by investing in the establishment of a National Security Agency/Police to perform the functions of monitoring, surveillance and security of, use of the modern technology- CCTV cameras, helicopters, drones, etc. Also, the FGN needs to take the Bull by the horns to protect the Nigeria’s critical infrastructure through the empowering of the citizens via an awareness campaign to educate the Nigerian masses about their role, importance of and the need to protecting the Nigerian critical infrastructure for the national development. Honestly speaking, the FGN needs to employ a radical approach to curb the vandalism and destruction practices of the country’s critical infrastructure sector. But, for those violators – the scanvengers, who continue to deliberately to vandalize, destroy and steal many parts or materials from the nation’s critical infrastructure like the manhole covers, metals from the railway tracks and bridge rails, they should be treated as criminals and should be arrested, charged and prosecuted in the Nigerian courts. These scavengers shouldn’t be given a free pass to destroy and steal the country’s critical infrastructure in their efforts at making some Nairas, at the expense of the Nigeria’s national security and the safety of the citizens. This practice of vandalism and the destruction of the Nigeria’s critical infrastructure needs to stop, because it is exacerbating the country’s critical infrastructure problems and its deficit.
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