The Minister of Works, Senator Dave Umahi, has announced a presidential directive on the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway. President Bola Tinubu has ordered the ministry not to create an entirely new greenfield alignment from the end of Ondo State into Edo State. Instead, the highway will merge with and incorporate the corridor of the existing East-West Road. Umahi disclosed this at a press briefing in Abuja.
The Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway is the flagship road project of the Tinubu administration. It is designed to run 700 kilometres along the coastline, from Lagos to Calabar. The East-West Road is older. It was built decades ago. It connects Warri, Benin, Port Harcourt and Calabar. It was not designed for current climate conditions. Sections along the Edo and Delta axis have been submerged by heavy flooding in recent years. The government spent billions on emergency repairs. The new directive changes the coastal highway’s route. It merges the two projects into one corridor.
Umahi explained the rationale. “Mr President has directed that we should not create a new alignment from the end of Ondo into Edo State,” he said. “Rather, we should merge with the East-West Road.” The minister said the legacy road was built without anticipating modern climate change. Sea and river levels now surge beyond historic projections. The Edo and Delta sections have repeatedly flooded. Emergency interventions have been temporary. The merger allows a permanent engineering fix.
The revised plan will raise the East-West Road alignment by up to two metres in multiple flood-prone sections. That elevates the carriageway above projected flood lines. The alignment also incorporates roughly 45 kilometres along the Benin Bypass. That routes through-traffic and heavy commercial haulage around Benin City. Trucks bound for the South-South and Delta will no longer be trapped in the city’s congestion.
The directive has implications. It reduces the length of new construction. It saves costs. It also avoids duplication. Two major federal roads will share one corridor. The East-West Road will be upgraded as part of the coastal highway project. That accelerates its rehabilitation.
Winners: The Federal Government, which saves money and avoids duplication. Commuters, who gain a flood-proof road. Haulage operators, who bypass Benin City. Communities along the East-West Road, which gain upgrades. The Ministry of Works, which gets a clearer mandate. Losers: Contractors expecting greenfield construction. Communities on the abandoned alignment, which lose expected access. The Benin City economy, if through-traffic bypasses it. Taxpayers, if the merged project is poorly executed. The coastal highway’s original timeline, which may shift.
Bottom Line: The coastal highway will not be a standalone greenfield road. It will merge with the East-West Road. The roadbed will be raised. Benin City will be bypassed. The directive is practical. It saves money. It addresses flooding. But it also reveals that the original alignment was flawed. The coastal highway was planned without accounting for the terrain it would cross. The government corrected it. That is good governance. It is also an admission of poor planning. Nigeria’s infrastructure must be climate-proof from the start. Retrofitting costs more.