Lagos-Ibadan Railway: Commercial operation begins December 7 – FG
•Govt
denies requesting additional fund
•We are constructing railways to Nigeria for job creation – Amaechi
The Nigerian Railway Corporation
(NRC) has announced that commercial activities will begin on the Lagos-Ibadan
Railway on December 7. This was disclosed when the Minister of Transportation,
Rotimi Amaechi, visited for his monthly inspection of the ongoing work. The
Minister was accompanied by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Dr. Magdalene
Ajani and Managing Director of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), Fidet
Okhiria.
At the Agege substation, the
Minister expressed dismay at what he called the slow pace of work, even as he
told the personnel of the contractor, the China Civil Engineering Construction
Company (CCECC) that he would return on-site on December 19 to ascertain the
progress of work. He also debunked media reports which suggested that the
government is requesting an additional $650million for the completion of the
project.
The Federal Government had come
under criticism for requesting an additional loan despite the claim that the
job was at 90 per cent completion level.
Amaechi during its monthly inspection of the rail project clarified that the
government never requested an additional loan for the project, saying the
$650million loan that has long been approved was for the Lagos-Ibadan and
Itakpe-Warri lines.
He decried the pace of work on
the Lagos-Ibadan rail line project stating that inadequate manpower was slowing
it down, appealing to the contractor to engage more hands to speed up the pace
of work.
According to The Guardian, it was gathered that though
contract staff handling different aspects of the project numbered about 10, 000
before the outbreak of COVID-19, the current strength is about 3,000.
Amaechi said: “I never told the
National Assembly we required $650 million additional loan. What we laid was
the cost of the contract, which was between $1.6. The $650million was for extra
work for Itakpe-Warri and Lagos-Ibadan, and that has been approved a very long
time.
“All the funds we required for
the project have been approved and we don’t need additional money. Speaking on
the Kano-Maradi line, the Minister insisted that the project is purely based
based on economic development and employment consideration.
He said: “We are tired of making
this explanation; we don’t have wives in Niger Republic. My first time in
Niamey was three weeks ago, and I was there to request for a right of way and
land to build warehouses.
“We are doing it to grow the economy and
create employment. Even if we stop it at Jibya, Jibya to Niger is just a
20-minute drive.
“I have said that we are not
competing well with Benin Republic, Togo, Cameroon and Ghana over cargos that
come from a landlocked state. The excuse they gave is that for the poor
competition is that our roads are bad, criminals attack them, multiple
checkpoints and they are unable to do business because of the high cost of
transactions.
“So, if we must compete
favourably, transaction costs must compete favourably. Nigeria has to make the
sacrifice of not just rebuilding their roads but also the rail lines.
“What this means is that goods
going to the Niger Republic can be processed by the Nigerian Customs at Maradi
and transported to Apapa seaport in which case there will be no police,
customs, immigration checks.”
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