Few months ago, when the news and pictures of the Chinese wonder bridge hit the media, it did not tickle our surprise gland as one would expect, given that attributing such huge projects to a big economy like China is probably not expected to elicit amazements. But the Mega Bridge; stretching thirty-four miles, and the world’s longest cross-sea bridge, should have definitely taught us a sore lesson, and reminded us, as a nation, of our laxity and failures to optimize our resources – human and infrastructural potentials. 
It should have reminded our country of the carcass figure of the River Niger Bridge, or bitterly, the lingering political dramas surrounding the perpetually-proposed Second Niger Bridge project. But it never did, that is our dear country. The beauty of the new China bridge may not probably be that it will be up and running for one hundred and twenty years or that the construction was initiated and completed in less than eight years. No; the true beauty of the wonder bridge is that it is reported to have a construction estimate of fifteen billion dollars, a sum that stands an echo-end distance from what is laundered from our national treasury every fiscal year. 
An analyst, in trying to prepare a suitable analogy of the filthy politics encircling the proposed Second Niger Bridge, described it as “Ogbanje” – the mythical ill-fated lad that keeps dying and being born, repeatedly. As in Ogbanje, the Bridge has become a weapon to lure, rape and dump unsuspecting Nigerians, especially from the East, by various governments at various times. As the 2019 general elections inch closer, the centre seems stage for the usual story on the bridge.
No doubt, the calls for a Second Niger Bridge became loud following the ageing beauty and dwindling durability of the current Niger Bridge. The existing Bridge was commissioned by the late Prime Minister, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa in December 1965 –his last public function before he was killed in the January 15 Military coup. Fifty-three years after, the story still tastes as flavourless as the history of our stuttering national process. 
The call for a Second Niger Bridge also attracted huge petitions on account of steady increase in population, coupled with upsurge in economic activities and urbanization. The surge in human and vehicular traffic on the bridge had begun to impact on it, gravely. In countries that priotize national infrastructure and even domestication of critical amenities, projects as important as the Second Niger Bridge would not be allowed to linger on like a helpless orphan. 
Over the past two decades, the yearnings for a new Niger Bridge have been stifled into a tool for cheap politicking and craftiness among the Nigerian politicians. Votes from the South East are specifically interchanged with the promise of immediate construction of the Second Niger Bridge, when they win. Then, as a people, hungry for development, we would give our votes, hopeful that we would also soon flaunt our new bridge on the social media. 
Sadly, billions of Naira would be announced on the mainstream media, to perhaps stir up hopes, and that would be it for another four years. However, the social and economic importance of the River Niger Bridge amplifies the urgency of a new and more sophisticated one. 
The South Eastern part of the country, Anambra State especially, has become a fast-growing economic beehive of Nigeria, the second largest economy. The Onitsha and Nnewi Markets have proven a highly competitive spot for national and international business transactions. In fact, the Onitsha Main Market, the largest in West Africa, stands grandly on the shores of the River.
Thus, a new Niger Bridge will not only simplify and boost business check-ins into the South East; it will add to our national collections, and most importantly, save lives and ease the growing burden on the current one. Just like the new China bridge, a second Niger Bridge will open up boundless trade, tourism and vocational opportunities for the country in general. 
As an opinion article writer puts it: “The River Niger Bridge, is not a project for Ndi Igbo. It is a Nigerian project for Nigerians. In abandoning the Second Niger Bridge or playing politics with its construction, it is the nation and its economy that count the loss. Also, fixing the facility that will serve as a major link for the larger geographical east, south-south, parts of the north and south west, cannot and should not be seen as favour to the south east or any geo-political zone.

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