SALIU SALIU
KANO State Executive Council has approved the release of N8.98 billion for the construction of Muhammadu Buhari Interchange in the state.
The interchange will be sited at NNPC Mega Station Rotary Intersection, Hotoro, along Maiduguri Road, in the Kano metropolis, as parts of efforts to address traffic congestion in Kano State.
This was disclosed by the Commissioner for Information in the state, Muhammad Garba, on Tuesday.
He said, “The project was part of the present administration’s commitment to constructing road networks to address increasing traffic congestion in line with its policy of transforming Kano into a Mega City as well as boosting commercial activities.
“Being an emerging megacity and important commercial centre in the country, Kano has been recording a significant increase in the influx of commercial traffic and therefore the need to redesign and improve existing road networks to support additional volumes of generated traffic in order to allow for safer and more efficient vehicular movements.”
Garba added, “More so, the state council has given approval for the release of the sum of N44.3 million for the re-accreditation and resource visitation requirements for Audu Bako College of Agriculture, Dambatta.
“The departments that the mandatory re-accreditation exercise covers comprise Agricultural Extension and Management, Forestry Technology, Home and Rural Economics, Bio-Environmental Engineering Technology as well as Library.”
He added that the Council approved the inclusion and utilisation of the savings realised from the implementation of the Universal Basic Education (UBE) 2019 Normal Fund Intervention Projects, amounting to N32, 797, 774.66 million from the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB).
According to him, the projects include construction of two-blocks of two classrooms at Bakin Kasuwa and Minkyau Primary School, renovation of blocks A and B, renovation of toilets at Minkyau and Bakin Kasuwa Primary Schools, respectively.
He also disclosed that the Council had approved the release of N13.5 million for the procurement of textbooks, titled, ‘Basic Science for Senior Secondary Schools’; the sum of N12.68 million for Comprehensive Islamic Studies for Junior Secondary Schools, classes 1-3 and Senior Secondary Schools, classes 1-3; as well as procurement of Mathematics textbooks at the cost of N17.6 million.
The Council has also approved the state Public Debt Management Office Bill 2020 and the transmission of the same to the state House of Assembly for passage into law, he said.
When passed, the law will allow for the establishment of the Public Debt Management Office in the state as part of ongoing institutional reforms at all levels of government with a view to achieving the desired objectives of transparency and accountability in governance.
