Residents of Gwarzo town in the Kano North Senatorial District are protesting the “planned demolition” of a bridge constructed by an opposition lawmaker.
The bridge located at the Gwarzo town bypass was washed away three weeks ago after a torrential rain.
Residents of the area subsequently appealed to the Deputy Senate President, Barau Jibrin, who is the representative of the area in the Senate to help fix the damaged bridge.
Mr Jibrin is a member of the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state.
They said Mr Jibrin responded promptly and repair work on the bridge was completed on Friday.
A driver, Sule Wanzam, who witnessed the protest said residents started protesting on Friday after they learned that the Kano State government was reportedly planning to demolish the bridge so as to build a better one. The protest continued on Saturday morning.
The bridge is strategic because it is along the road leading to the residence of the deputy governor who is from Gwarzo town, Mr Wanzam said.
“The bridge connects to the residence of the state’s deputy governor, Aminu Abdulsalam, which made some of the government officials and members of his party (New Nigeria People Party) in the town feel offended over the speedy construction of the bridge, by Mr Jibrin, who is member of the All Progressives Congress (APC).”
The residents described the “planned demolition” of the bridge as political.
The incident led to tension in the area on Friday and Saturday as the supporters of the two main parties, the APC and NNPP pointed accusing fingers at each other.
The APC members in the town vowed not to allow the demolition of the bridge.
When reached for comment, the state’s Commissioner for Works, Marwan Ahmad, said the state was yet to decide the fate of the bridge.
He explained that Mr Jibrin did not obtain an approval before repairing the bridge, which is on a state government road.
“It’s the work of the state government but they went ahead to do it. Even at that, they ought to have sought our approval (state government) before embarking on the state government project,” said Mr Ahmad.
“It’s not a matter of delay from the state government in fixing the bridge, the (state) government has a bureaucracy, we have completed all the processes, and we were about to start the work when they went and started.
“The problem emanated from the reluctance to seek approval before embarking on the work. If they had sought our approval we would have briefed them about our level of engagement about the repairing of the bridge.
“I can’t say whether the work will be demolished or not until the government decides on the next steps,” Mr Ahmad said.
But one of the aides of the deputy senate president, Muktar Gora, said the local government council okayed the request of the lawmaker to embark on the projects.
“The local government council has approved our request, It’s an emergency work that affects the lives of the locals, and we can’t fold our hands to see our people suffering, We decided to take the emergency work following the request of the locals and the work has been done with the consent of the local government council,” Mr Gora said.
Abubakar Maishanu
