The Minister of State for Aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika, says the Masterplan of the new terminal building at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, will be altered due to foundational issues.
According to the minister, these foundational issues are the control and fire towers discovered to be blocked by the terminal building, adding that these would have to be relocated.
He said additional work was also required to link the building with the existing terminal as well as expanding the apron to accommodate bigger air planes.
He said these had led to the continued delay in the completion of work.
Sirika, who stated this during an inspecting the project, explained that the planning of the project did not envisage that the building would lead to additional works, power and water supply.
“There is also the problem of the control tower blocking the access into the terminal apron and also the inadequate nature of the apron itself.
Another reason according to Sirika, is the insufficient capacity of the existing power and water supply in the airport to cater for the new building.
He noted that these challenges would result in requiring additional funds.
“The contractor has told us some of the challenges he has been facing regarding some of the components of work and some additional works required for this project to be put into use.
“Unfortunately, some of these components are complex which would delay this job and some of them are from the foundation like that of the sewer and water.
According to him, the project is being funded through 500 million dollars loan from Chinese EXIM bank and 100 million dollars counterpart funding from Nigerian government.
“The quality of work is acceptable but the pace of work is not acceptable because this project should have been delivered by now”.
