The ECOWAS Bank for Investment and Development (EBID) has approved $100 million facility for the construction of a 47.7 kilometres of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway project.
The decision was taken at the Board of Directors’ 92nd Ordinary Session meeting held on June 30 in Abuja.
Based on the project’s design, the 47.7 kilometres segment, designated as Section 1, Phase 1 of the project, starts from Ahmadu Bello Way in Lagos to the coastal corridor of other states.
According to a report from the bank on the meeting, the approval was part of a broader round of commitments announced during its 92nd ordinary session, where the Board disclosed that it had allocated a total of €174 million and $125 million for infrastructure and social development projects respectively across the West African sub-region.
The bank stated that the $100 million facility for the Lagos-Calabar highway construction was intended to improve access across the nine states through which the highway project would be executed, improve connectivity to seaports and remote agro-industrial zones, and by implication, ease movement of goods and services along the economic corridor.
In addition, the development finance bank projected that the highway project would help develop a regional value chain that supports the livelihoods of coastal communities and also contribute to the emergence of a regional value chain to help coastal communities.
The report partly reads: “A $100m Lagos-Calabar coastal motorway project, in the Federal Republic of Nigeria. This project, which spans 47.7km, will link nine Nigerian states, improve access to seaports and isolated agro-industrial areas, and contribute to the emergence of a regional value chain to help coastal communities.”
The report listed other approved projects by the EBID’s board at the meeting as including a €50m investment for the construction and equipping of six technical and vocational education centres in Togo, aimed at training 3,480 youths annually in high-demand skills, and €28.9m committed to modernization of four agricultural high schools and an additional €95.16m for the construction of three hydroelectric micro-power stations with a combined capacity of 30MW to improve renewable energy access in rural areas in Guinea,
In Côte d’Ivoire, the EBID board approved $25m to support clinker imports by Société de Ciment de Côte d’Ivoire to boost cement production and ease material shortages in the construction sector.
The bank clarified that the latest investments aligned with several United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDG 9, which focuses on Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure.
The report added: “These newly approved commitments are aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, in particular SDG 4 – Quality Education, SDG 7 – Affordable and Clean Energy and SDG 9 – Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure, as well as EBID’s strategic plan to promote resilient, inclusive and sustainable growth and development in the ECOWAS region.
“With this investment, EBID’s total commitments to date in the sub-region amount to over $5bn”, it added.
Experts believe that the EBID’s funding support for the project, of which construction commenced in March 2024 and is being handled by Hitech Construction Company Limited, will help the Federal Government in completing the 700 kilometre Lagos-Calabar coastal highway by 2028 timeline set for it.
It would be recalled that the Federal Government kicked off the construction of the road in March 2024. The Minister of Works, David Umahi, recently disclosed that the Federal Government procured contracts worth over N3 trillion for sections of the Lagos-Calabar Highway spanning Lagos, Akwa Ibom, and Cross River States.
