The Lagos State chapter of the All Progressives Congress has berated the Peoples Democratic Party governorship candidate, Mr. Jimi Agbaje, for promising to scrap the Lekki-Epe tollgate if he emerges as governor next month.

The APC in a statement by its Publicity Secretary, Mr. Joe Igbokwe, said the promise was either naive or a ‘blatant lie’ to con Lagosians into voting for him.

It said at a time when oil prices were dropping and Federal Government allocations to states had reduced, it would be unwise for Lagos, which currently has the highest Internally Generated Revenue in the country, to begin to lose resources.

The APC said Agbaje’s promise was hypocritical as the PDP-led Federal Government, which is working on a Second Niger Bridge, plans to collect tolls on the bridge for 25 years.

It said the federal Airport Road, which is in shambles, also had a tollgate and wondered why Agbaje was bothering himself with the Lekki-Epe Expressway.

The APC said it was funny that Agbaje could criticise the state government for the manner it had embarked on the construction of the Lekki-Epe Expressway when the Federal Government had neglected all its roads in Lagos, including the Lagos-Ikorodu Road and the Lagos-Badagry Expressway, which are being constructed by the state government.

The statement read, “Lagosians are aware that the dilapidated Airport Road, which the PDP-led Federal Government has abandoned while playing politics with completed world-class roads in Lagos, has a tollgate and we wonder why Agbaje and Lagos PDP have not promised Lagosians that their assumed government will not only stop toll collection on the road but will build it in the unlikely event that they control the government of Lagos State.

“Lagos APC notes that out of frustration from the criminal negligence the PDP Federal Government has meted out to federal roads in Lagos for the past 16 years, the Lagos State Government has undertaken the reconstruction of many federal roads in Lagos and is currently delivering world-class reconstruction of such roads like the Lagos- Ikorodu Road and the Lagos- Badagry Expressway which serves as a gateway to the country but which had been completely abandoned by the PDP Federal Government.

“But we find it alarming that someone that dreams of governing Lagos is issuing such economically disastrous threats to foreign investors in a state like Lagos when the Federal Government, under the control of his party, has made the sing-song of attracting elusive foreign investment the epicentre of its failed economic programme for the past 16 years.”