Nigeria Times

The Ministry of Transportation has disclosed it will give priority attention to the completion of ongoing railway projects while commencing new ones. This will spur economic activities while facilitating trade not just in Nigeria but with her West African neighbors.

According to a statement by Director Press and Public Relations, Ministry of Transportation, Eric Ojiekwe, the Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, made this known while presenting a total capital budget of N 147, 931, 691, 294, and overhead of N 358, 799, 998, as the 2022 Budget proposal of the Federal Ministry of Transportation to the Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Representatives on Land and Marine Transport at the National Assembly Complex in Abuja

“We will continue to construct more rail lines to connect other African or West African countries who are involved in rail management. The moment we do this logistics so that from point A to B, you can move cargo, you can move human beings, you can move trade” the Minister said.

During the interactive session with the Joint Committee members, Amaechi stressed on the need for the members to support government drive on the ongoing Dry Ports projects across the country which includes the Baro Dry Port and Lokoja River Port, saying they will only thrive if an interface or linkage of the proposed rail lines are completed as Rivers Benue and Niger have a depth of 3 meters and only barges and tugboats can operate within such parameters.

“Railway is the key to Baro, railway is the key to Lokoja, whatever you produce, you can put it on top of that train, if you can excavate it and put it on top, that rail will take it to where you want it to go. So, our intention was if we can take railway to everywhere in Nigeria, we would have peace, if it is passengers, it will have, if it is cargo, it will have” Amaechi said.

Reacting to “Why rail line should lead to Maradi in Niger Republic Amaechi said construction of the Standard Gauge line will enable interconnectivity with countries in the West Africa sub region for the promotion of trade and commerce”. He also explained that Kano-Maradi was not borne out of his personal ambition but rather a survey which had been carried out by previous administrations and government been a continuum, he only deemed it fit to implement the plan taking into consideration the viability of the project when completed. Besides, he further explained that the rail linkage that gets to Maradi is only 20 kilometres

On the issue of why the Eastern rail line was narrow gauge and not standard gauge, the Minister explained that he had two approvals from President Muhammadu Buhari for narrow gauge and standard gauge. But since getting the money to reconstruct the narrow gauge is easier, it made economic sense to connect the whole country by narrow gauge while still sourcing for funds to do the standard gauge.

Furthermore, the Minister explained that the main difference between the narrow gauge and the standard gauge was merely speed. While the former does 100 km/h, the latter does 120 km/h.

Reacting to the issue of loans, the Minister informed that the only money borrowed so far is the $ 1.4 billion spent on Lagos – Ibadan rail, explaining that loan approvals do not translate to cash.

According to the Minister, thus far, the completed and flagged-off rail corridors of Lagos-Ibadan, Warri-Itakpe, Abuja-Kaduna for commercial operations has employed over 500 skilled workers, 1 million indirect employments not forgetting to mention commercial activities that have received a stimulus along these corridors.

Responding to reasons behind the cut in budgetary submission of the Nigeria Railway Corporation (NRC) from 18 billion in 2021 to 7 billion naira in 2022. The Transport Minister said “The NRC must move from being dependent on government to being dependent on themselves. I am not saying they are not doing well. After all, we are getting 350 million now from Abuja -Kaduna ….. It was 70 million” He further disclosed that from the proceeds, the Ministry has been able to sustain work along other rail corridors and cleared that the Managing Director, NRC, to see and run the Corporation as though it was a personal business in order to generate more funds for government while a charting a course for self-reliance.

In her contribution on the ongoing rail projects, the Minister of State for Transportation, Sen. Gbemisola Ruqayyah Saraki, said that the rail projects are not personal as against public opinion. Adding that with ratification of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement, the proposed and ongoing rail projects positions Nigeria to be more competitive regionally.

Minister of Transportation Chibuike Amaechi has reassured Nigerians that there would be improved security on the Abuja/Kaduna train route even as passenger service resumes Saturday.

The service was suspended by the Nigeria Railway Corporation (NRC) after a suspected terrorist attack on a train and tracks on Wednesday.

Amaechi who revealed plans to digitalize security on the nation’s railway facilities during an unscheduled assessment tour of the train service to ascertain the level of damage caused on the rail tracks after it was attacked with explosives.

He said, ” We want to assure the public that beyond the physical presence of Police and the Military along this track, we will get a rail bus for patrol regularly so that we can see what is happening even before the train takes off, and it will be end to end. Apart from this, there has not been any security challenges on this track. What this has done to us is that we would fasten the procurement process of the digital security system that we planned to put in place. It has gone to the Cabinet two weeks ago and it has returned. So, we’ll re-present it to Cabinet to ensure that we get approval for the installation.

“The essence of the digital security system is to enable us to know when there’s an impact on the rail to forestall this kind of attack. We will get the Police involved so that they will be here before the installation of the digital facility”he said.

The Minister said , though he may not be happy that the attack occured, fact has shown that Nigerian Engineers are now capable of constructing their own railway.

Hear him, “I am not happy that the security breach took place but what it has done is to show that we actually have the capacity to fix our rail . The essence of this is to make sure that by the time the Chinese leaves we should start the gradual process of constructing our own railway. The repair was done by our own Nigerian Engineers in record time and by tomorrow (Saturday) we will run the first train”, he said.

Speaking during the inspection, the Managing Director of the NRC, Fidet Okhiria insisted that it was better to run more trains as running more trains would not give people the opportunity to tamper/interfere with the tracts.

He disclosed that a train just passed from Abuja to kaduna not quite 30mins when the explosion were executed and planted.

“The people would have to work very hard to be able to plant explosives. I believe that when we restart we would start with eight trips when we come back tomorrow maybe tomorrow we may run four trips but Sunday eight trips because Sunday is a busy day. After fixing the locomotive that was affected, we would run our usual ten trips”.

“On safety, the Commissioner of police came here, the dss are now going to be fully involved. The minster spoke about inntroducing technology and we have an active responsive team that would respond to the information that would be provided by the technology”.

He disclosed that the organisation will not yield to the scare tactics by the bandits.

“We should not be scared so that we don’t allow the people who don’t wish Nigeria well to succeed. I would say that we are determined to provide service for Nigerians and Nigerians should also be determined to not allow the system to die”.

The Manager of Abuja-Kaduna rail line assured passengers assured passengers who bought tickets but couldn’t make their of the option of refund.

“NRC is a very responsible organisation. We are going to give them the option of reusing that ticket for a rescheduled trip. However there may be some pockets of cases where people are not regular customers or passengers on this route say someone from lagos and may not come back until after a year, we can’t ask the person to keep the ticket perpetually . If such people seek for refund, we go to the mobile process and refund it.”

Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi has made a case for Port State Control Officers (PSCOs) to display high level of professionalism in carrying out their duties of inspecting foreign ships at national ports.

Amaechi spoke at the 11th Port State Control Committee (PSC) Meeting of the Memorandum of Understanding on PSC for West and Central Africa Region also known as Abuja MoU, Wednesday in Lagos.

This was contained in a statement signed by the Director Press and Public Relations, Ministry of Transportation, Eric Ojiekwe and made available to the Nigeria Times.

The Minister explained that the essence of PSC is, “the inspection of Ships, to verify their condition, equipment, and whether the ship is manned and operated in compliance with the requirements of international conventions and regulations to ensure maritime safety and security of lives, assets and to prevent pollution.”

Referring to PSCOs as ambassadors of the MoU, the Minister stated that continuous trainings are required to maintain set standards at Ports, and called on member states to work together in achieving set goals.

“Bearing in mind that Port State Control Officers are ambassadors of the MoU, it is therefore important that they constantly undergo continuous trainings which would impact on their knowledge and skills, as well as on their overall standard of inspections at the Ports. However, this cannot be achieved without the commitment, financial and otherwise of every Member State.

“We must all join forces and strive to ensure that we constantly uphold the ideals and objectives upon which the MoU was established. For this reason, I urge all Member States to play their part in contributing towards the growth of the Abuja MoU, so that we can constantly meet with expectations and safeguard our marine domains,” he said.

Amaechi however thanked Member states for ensuring that the Abuja MoU performed well in the face of Covid19 and urged them not to relent in their commitments to inspections, trainings and overall contributions.

“I must thank most of our Member States for their performance and swift responses in declaring seafarers as key workers and in lending their support to ensure that the impact of COVID- 19 did not disrupt global shipping. While it is to be noted that the resulting effect of the pandemic slowed down inspection of vessels, nonetheless, based on our 2020 Report, the Abuja MoU performed relatively well in the inspection of vessels that called at our Ports,” he said.

In the same vein, Ghana’s Minister of Transportation and Chairman of Abuja MoU, Hon. Kwaku Ofori Asiamah, in his opening speech said “Port State Control acts as an important safety-net to eliminate the operation of sub-standard ships to ensure the needed safety. It is therefore refreshing to note that notwithstanding the COVID-19 pandemic, our performance as Flag States have been very encouraging.

He called on member states to “prioritise the vaccination of seafarers, their off and on signings, especially in the repatriation process, and ensure strict adherence to COVID-19 protocols to protect PSCOs and Crew of vessels visiting their ports.

Asiamah also stated that member states “must be guided by the IMO’s Code of Good Practice for Port State Control Officers and other relevant circulars and Statutory Documents in conducting inspections within the Framework of the Regional Memorandum of Understanding and Agreement on Port State Control,” while ensuring that their PSCOs are empowered to safely conduct inspections, “and to always aim at exceeding the agreed 15per cent minimum number of foreign vessels that call at our ports. States should also accept and endorse the IMO’s guidelines on Cyber Security as part of the Safety Management Codes,” he said.

The Ghanian Minister also called on women to explore careers in PSC and other related fields as according to him, “Women are great agents of change.” He tasked member states to create avenues for the participation of women as Port State Control Officers.

Other Ministers at the meeting include Sierra Leone’s Minister of Transport and Aviation, Hon. Kabineh Kallon and Nigeria’s Minister of State for Transportation, Sen. Gbemisola Ruquayya Saraki among others participating online.