By Tony Edike
How successive governments have repeatedly promised to open up Kogi’s agricultural powerhouse — and why residents are tired of waiting
For decades, the people of Ibaji Local Government Area of Kogi State have watched politicians arrive with promises of development, particularly the construction of the roads that would finally connect their isolated communities to the rest of Nigeria.
Then the elections come.
Campaigns are held. Political leaders visit. Road projects are announced or flagged off. Contracts are mentioned. Hope rises among the people.
And, according to residents and repeated reports about abandoned projects, the construction often disappears from the political radar once the election is over.
For Ibaji, this has become more than a problem of bad roads. It has become a question of political accountability.
The most enduring symbol of this frustration is the long-promised Otuocha–Ibaji–Idah road corridor, which residents believe could fundamentally transform the local government by opening it to commerce, investment, agriculture and social development.
A food basket trapped behind bad roads
Ibaji occupies a strategically important position along the River Niger and has enormous agricultural potential.
The local government is known for farming and fishing, producing crops including rice, yam and cassava. Yet the same geographical and agricultural advantages that could make Ibaji a major economic hub have been undermined by inadequate transportation infrastructure.
The contradiction is stark: a community capable of contributing significantly to Nigeria’s food supply continues to struggle with the basic infrastructure required to move its agricultural products to markets.
Poor roads increase transportation costs, discourage investment and make it more difficult for farmers to get their produce to consumers.
During the rainy and flooding seasons, the problem becomes even more severe.
Reports have documented the extent to which flooding and damaged roads have isolated communities in Ibaji, with residents sometimes relying on bicycles, motorcycles and waterways where roads become impassable.
For a predominantly agrarian community, this is not simply an inconvenience.
It is an economic handicap.
The promise that keeps returning
The history of the Otuocha–Ibaji–Idah corridor illustrates the frustration.
In 2009, the Federal Government reportedly awarded the approximately 90-kilometre Otuocha–Ibaji–Idah road to Nigercat Nigeria Limited for about N7.2 billion, with reports putting the mobilisation payment at about N2.5 billion.
Yet the project subsequently stalled.
Years later, the road remained a subject of complaints by Ibaji residents and community groups.
The road was still being discussed when another promise came from the Kogi State Government.
Yahaya Bello’s 2017 flag-off
In April 2017, then Kogi State Governor Yahaya Bello visited Ibaji and flagged off the construction of the 40-kilometre Idah–Onyedega road.
The contract was reported to be worth more than N5 billion.
At the ceremony, Bello said the road would be asphalt-overlaid and that its completion would boost the economy of the area.
The message was significant because even the then Deputy Governor, Simon Achuba, an indigene of Ibaji, acknowledged that the local government had long been neglected and that roads were its major problem.
The state’s Works Commissioner at the time described Ibaji as the state’s “Food Basket” and said the lack of roads was an impediment to its development.
The people had every reason to hope.
But according to subsequent reports, the promise did not translate into the completed road residents were expecting.
By 2021, a report on the project stated that work had still not commenced and described the road as practically impassable. The report recalled that Bello had promised that the construction would take 24 months.
In 2023, a motion before the House of Representatives also raised concerns about the condition and neglect of the road, stating that since the flag-off of its rehabilitation, no work had commenced.
The election-cycle question
This is where the political frustration in Ibaji becomes difficult to ignore.
Residents have seen one administration after another return to the same fundamental problem: the road.
The criticism from the community is not that politicians should not promise infrastructure.
It is that promises should be followed by construction.
For a community that has heard road promises repeatedly, the real measure of government commitment is not another flag-off ceremony, another speech or another campaign visit.
It is asphalt on the ground.
Then came another governor
After Yahaya Bello’s tenure, his successor, Governor Ahmed Usman Ododo, also visited Ibaji.
In July 2026, Ododo met with traditional rulers, community leaders, women, youths and other stakeholders in the local government and announced that the design for a proposed Ibaji Road Project had been completed and was available for public review before construction.
The Federal Ministry of Information described the proposed road as a strategic intervention that could improve access to markets, schools and healthcare while unlocking Ibaji’s economic and agricultural potential.
The announcement was naturally welcomed.
But it also raises an unavoidable question:
How many more times will Ibaji hear that its road is about to be constructed?
Because for residents who remember previous promises, the existence of a design is not the same thing as the existence of a completed road.
And now, the Federal Government
Just as the controversy surrounding the road continues, another major development emerged in July 2026.
Anambra State Governor Chukwuma Soludo announced that President Bola Tinubu had approved the Otuocha–Anam–Abaji road for design and procurement, alongside another major South-East highway project.
The Federal Government’s announcement describes the Otuocha–Anam–Abaji corridor as approximately 108 kilometres and says it will link Anambra with Kogi and North-Central Nigeria.
Kogi-based reports subsequently described the project as the Otuocha–Nzam–Ibaji Road and connected it to the long-standing demand for the Otuocha–Ibaji–Idah corridor.
The development has understandably generated excitement.
After all, this is precisely the type of regional infrastructure Ibaji residents have been demanding for years . This is similar to the age long clamor for the provision of electricity in the local government, which has remained in the dark since its creation. The entire people of Ibaji have not enjoyed public power supply for decades yet the area has remained a vote-hunting hub for politicians in all elections.
This has also raises a question that government officials should answer clearly:
Is this move by Ododo finally the road Ibaji has been waiting for — or will it become another announcement that disappears after the political season?
That question is not an accusation of wrongdoing against any individual.
It is a legitimate question arising from the history of abandoned and repeatedly announced road projects in the area.
The Hope Uzodinma connection
The announcement has also attracted attention in the wider South-East, including from political leaders in neighbouring states.
The involvement of Anambra and Imo in the wider regional road agenda is significant because the Otuocha corridor is not merely an Ibaji road.
It has the potential to connect agricultural communities in Anambra and Kogi and strengthen commercial links between the South-East, North-Central and South-South regions.
That is precisely why the project deserves to be treated as an economic corridor rather than merely another local political promise.
Can Ibaji afford another disappointment?
For the people of Ibaji, the issue is bigger than party politics.
The community wants a road.
A real road.
An asphalted, durable and properly engineered road capable of remaining accessible during the rainy season and capable of carrying agricultural produce, commercial vehicles and passengers.
They want the road to connect farmers to markets.
They want businesses to be able to come into Ibaji.
They want easier access to hospitals and schools.
They want young people to have opportunities beyond leaving or dumping their communities because of infrastructural isolation.
They want their agricultural wealth to become economic wealth.
And they want the government to understand that a road can change the destiny of an entire local government.
The politics of promises
The suspicion among some Ibaji residents that politicians remember the road mainly during election seasons is therefore understandable in the context of the project’s long history.
But suspicion is not proof.
If politicians want to demonstrate that the latest promise is different, the answer is straightforward: publish the documents and build the road.
Let the public know the contract sum.
Let the contractor be identified.
Let the scope of work be published.
Let the commencement date be known.
Let the completion date be known.
Let payments and milestones be transparently accounted for.
And, most importantly, let the people see continuous construction activity on the ground.
That is how another campaign promise becomes a development project.
Ibaji is asking for development, not political rhetoric
The people of Ibaji have waited long enough.
They have watched governments come and go.
They have listened to flag-off speeches.
They have heard promises of economic transformation.
They have watched projects stall.
They have endured roads that become almost impassable during the rainy season.
Yet the potential of Ibaji remains enormous.
With adequate infrastructure, the local government could become an important agricultural and commercial corridor between Kogi and the South-East.
The River Niger should be an economic advantage.
Its fertile agricultural land should be an economic advantage.
Its proximity to Anambra and other markets should be an economic advantage.
But without roads, those advantages remain severely constrained.
Enough of promises — let the road be built
The latest federal approval may provide a new opportunity.
But Ibaji residents have heard enough promises to know that approval alone is not the destination.
Design of the road is not construction.
Construction is not completion.
And a flag-off is not a road.
What the people are asking for is simple: an asphalted road that will finally open Ibaji to commerce, investment, agriculture, education, healthcare and the wider Nigerian economy.
They do not want another road project to become an election slogan.
They want to see the bulldozers arrive.
They want to see the earthworks completed.
They want to see bridges and drainage structures constructed.
They want to see asphalt laid.
And they want to drive on a completed road.
For a local government described by its own political leaders as a food basket, the continued infrastructural isolation is a contradiction that can no longer be ignored.
Ibaji does not need another promise. Ibaji needs a road.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu should please note that there is a place known as Ibaji bordered by four states of Enugu, Anambra, Delta and Edo (across the River Niger). And this local government is being administered by the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC.
Ibaji people have strongly supported his government and they deserve the attention of his government.
