The new face of Benue (1)

By ANDREW AGBESE

If you go to look for Terzungwe, who lives at High Level in Makurdi, between 8:00 am to 3:00 pm, it is most likely that you won’t meet him at home.

Ter (as his friends call him), retired from his civil service job five years ago, but he has found a new way to engage himself in a positive way.

He wakes up as early as he could to go to where there used to sit the High-Level round about, Makurdi, to watch the construction work on the new Underpass.

He is not alone. He is joined by 24-year-old Oche who comes all the way from North Bank to behold what “I have never seen since I was born.”

The two are joined by many others who come from as far as Igbor in Gwer West Local government Area of the state, to see the magic going on in Makurdi, the state capital

The ensemble of cranes, earthmoving machines and bulldozers are in the magnitude that many Benue people have not seen for decades, that they have to come out of their houses to behold what looks like magic to them.

It is like watching a football match to them as they behold with excitement how one machine passes the heap of earth to another and another drilling the soil to the point they think it will tip over.

They can’t remember when last they saw such works going on.

They only heard there was something like that when the River Benue bridge was constructed, or when Aper Aku initiated so many projects during his administration, or when Jonah Jang, as military governor, widened the roads.

Like their grandfathers told them what they beheld when Makurdi bridge was being constructed, they now have something to tell their children and grandchildren.

No doubt something positive is going on in Benue. It’s long silent engine is revved up.

Benue is now vibrating to the machines that will change its landscape for good.

The machines I’m told would also move to Gboko, Otukpo and other places.