Beyond the Asphalt: Why Borno’s broken roads need security, not scapegoats, by Abubakar M. Kareto
The recent federal approval and official flag-off of the N1.245 trillion Gombe to Biu Super Highway project has predictably sparked intense discussions across our region. While many rightly celebrate this major infrastructure milestone for the Northeast under President Bola Tinubu, a segment of casual onlookers has used the announcement to launch bitter criticisms against lawmakers representing Borno State at the National Assembly. These critics point aggressively at the deplorable conditions of vital federal roads like the Bama to Ngala axis or the Maiduguri to Damboa highway, demanding to know why similar multi-billion Naira interventions are not actively transforming those corridors. As a concerned citizen and an onlooker who believes in evaluating public affairs with a measure of objective logic, it is time we inject some hard operational facts and common sense into this debate.
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To understand why a comparison between Gombe and these specific Borno corridors is flawed, we must look at the structural reality facing construction companies on the ground. Signing a contract in the air-conditioned offices of Abuja is a simple administrative exercise, but executing that contract requires human beings to stand in open fields with heavy machinery. We have to ask ourselves a very honest question: how many contractors, regardless of the profit margins or budget allocations being offered, will willingly deploy their engineers, project managers, and laborers into zones where active security threats are a daily reality? Gombe State possesses a level of relative stability that allows firms like Hi-Tech Construction Company to mobilise personnel, establish unsecured base camps, and move logistics freely without the looming threat of asymmetric warfare.
However, the assumption that Borno lawmakers are completely idle is directly contradicted by ongoing legislative interventions. A perfect case in point is the strategic 105.6 kilometer Maiduguri to Monguno road project, a massive critical corridor that has been actively revived through the persistent efforts of Senator MT Monguno. Originally stalled for eight long years due to intense security bottlenecks, the contract was recently rescoped and expanded to a N28.37 billion project, backed by the NNPC Tax Credit Scheme and reinforced by special security coordination from the Office of the National Security Advisor. This ongoing project serves as clear proof that when the minimum security threshold is established, Borno lawmakers are fully capable of attracting mega-investments to their constituencies.
Yet, the operational reality of the Maiduguri to Monguno road itself illustrates why progress in Borno takes an entirely different shape than in Gombe. According to recent project tracking updates from the Federal Controller of Works in Borno, Engr. Salihu Adamu, contractors are working under strict emergency conditions. Because of security concerns and a restriction on local rock blasting, construction firms cannot simply source materials nearby; they are forced to take vastly longer, highly inefficient routes just to keep workers safe. They must haul basic base and sub-base laterite from Ngamdu near the Yobe border over 150 kilometers away, and truck stone-base aggregates from Shira in Bauchi State, a staggering 450 kilometers from the project sites. Contractors are even compelled to daily mobilise and demobilise heavy machinery from active areas just to protect equipment from sabotage.
Along the Damboa and Ngala corridors, the reality is even more stark. Troops of Operation Hadin Kai must routinely conduct fighting patrols and employ Explosive Ordinance Disposal teams to discover and detonate planted Improvised Explosive Devices just to escort civilian commuter convoys safely. Expecting a civil engineering firm to dualise a highway under the exact same conditions where military battalions are actively fighting to hold supply lines is a complete misjudgment of local realities. The skyrocketing cost of private security logistics, prolonged material haulage, and constant project suspensions mean that standard contract pricing models completely break down when applied to active conflict zones in Borno.
This is not to absolve the Federal Government of its ultimate constitutional responsibility to build, rehabilitate, and maintain these crucial national lifelines. The people of Bama, Ngala, and Damboa have suffered massive socio-economic losses due to broken infrastructure, and their clamor for development is entirely justified. However, we must stop putting the cart before the horse by blaming National Assembly representatives for a halt in civil construction when the prerequisite for that construction has not been fully met. Development cannot happen without stabilisation. When mega-projects are pushed into highly volatile sectors prematurely, hyper-inflated security costs quickly swallow the actual project funds, leading to abandoned sites, ruined equipment, and wasted public resources.
The fundamental truth remains unassailable: development cannot take place without security. As a region, our immediate priority must be aligned with the raw, painful realities facing our communities today. Currently, we are deeply mourning and collectively praying for the safe return of our innocent kidnapped children from the Mussa community in Askira Uba Local Government Area. When the safety of our schoolchildren is compromised and the lives of the soldiers defending us are constantly threatened on open highways, debating asphalt and contracts becomes a secondary luxury. We must collectively demand that the federal authorities focus entirely on establishing comprehensive safety first, because a secure environment is the only foundation upon which meaningful development can afterwards survive.
The bottom line is that heavy construction equipment simply cannot operate efficiently where soldiers are still engaged in securing the terrain and citizens are vulnerable to attack. If we genuinely want the federal roads connecting Borno’s border towns and internal hubs to look like the newly approved superhighway starting in Gombe, our focus must remain fixed on the primary objective. The very first contract that must be completely delivered by the federal authorities is the contract for absolute, uncompromised regional security. Until the asymmetric threat is neutralised and the terrain is stabilised for ordinary citizens and laborers alike, any massive infrastructure budget allocated to those volatile lines remains a check that cannot be practically cashed on the ground.
Abubakar M. Kareto is a Public Affairs Analyst.
Email: amkareto@gmail.com
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