The former Oyo State administration of the late Senator Abiola Ajimobi awarded about N1billion per kilometre for road construction, Seyi Makinde, Governor of the state, has revealed.

Makinde revealed this on Saturday morning during his quarterly media chat on BCOS Television.

Commenting on infrastructure in Oyo State, he explained that certain roads such as Moniya-Iseyin Road, Apete-Awotan-Akufo Road and Idi-Adipe Basorun Road would not be tolled.

“We won’t go into debt because people are paying taxes. Remember when we came in, IGR was less than N2 billion a month but we have been able to increase it to over N3 billion and we did this without raising taxes,” he said.

“We just expanded the tax base to include the informal sector. In fact, we reduced taxes. For example the motorcycle riders were complaining and we reduced their rate from N150 to N100. We are getting more money from expansion of tax base, these are people’s money so we have to use it right.”

Stating how much travel time has been cut from Moniya to Iseyin, the food basket of Oyo State, and how businesses have sprung up as a consequence of the road, he said: “The cost was N157 million per km; the standard is far above the federal roads. You can check how much the previous admin awarded roads per km — about N1billion per km.

“As we have linked Moniya to Iseyin and businesses are springing up, people are getting employed and we are taking our youths off the street. We will see the benefits.”