Adeyinka ADERIBIGBE
When he resumed office as the Minister of Transportation in December 2015, Mr Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi had his job cut out: improving on intermodal connectivity across all the states with the rail as the back bone.
Amaechi said President Muhammadu Buhari’s mandate was to connect all federating state capitals by rail by 2019, and in line with that vision, the government deepened the giant stride started by its predecessor in the implementation of the modernisation phase of the Nigerian Railway Corporation, in line with its 25-year master plan, which was kick-started in 2006.
The master plan was divided into two phases, the first being the modernisation of the rutted narrow gauge – the corporation’s surviving national heritage criss-crossing the West and Eastern lines, from Lagos – Kano (on the west line) and Port Harcourt – Maiduguri, called the Eastern line), which presently terminates at Gombe, because of the Northeast insurgency.
Although the Chief Olusegun Obasanjo administration which mid-wife the plan to renovate the 120-year old tracks, jump-started both initiatives with the repairs of the narrow gauge and reactivation of commercial service long suspended by successive military regimes under which the corporation almost declared bankruptcy,
it also signed an $8.6 billion contract with the China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC) for the Lagos-Kano standard gauge tracks construction. The administration also flagged off as a separate contract, the Abuja-Kaduna standard gauge line in 2006.
Though the late President Umar Musa Yar’Adua and his successor President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration almost completed the project, the glory of the commissioning went to President Muhammadu Buhari whose Minister, Rotimi Amaechi, got the project delivered in June 2017, after some 11 years of construction.
The Abuja-Kaduna standard gauge has become hugely successful and over-subscribed. The government also flagged off the Lagos-Ibadan Standard Gauge, the Lot II of the Lagos-Kano standard gauge, with a three-year mandate which terminates by May 2020.
Amaechi said only a modern train system would make the train attractive to the nation’s upper and middle class segments of the workers which formed the bulk of the commuting public for whom public transportation alternatives should be made a priority.
According to the minister, about 30 rolling stocks – made up of all classes of coaches –economy and first class, and locomotives, including two bullet diesel multiple units (DMU) had been ordered for and would be delivered to the Nigerian government before January ending to run the nation’s two standard gauge tracks (Abuja-Kaduna and Lagos-Ibadan).
Already, free train service now runs on the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge. The free service, which started on December 4 and is expected to run till April, is meant to fine tune the operation of the new train ahead of its inauguration in May and eventual commercial operation immediately after.
Amaechi said the massive influx of passengers at the Fagba Train Station where they board the free train has further confirmed experts’ prognosis that just like the Abuja-Kaduna train shuttle, the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge would be over-subscribed by passengers, who will see the train as a cheaper alternative to the traffic jam usually experienced on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.
Amaechi at a recent forum had said the Federal Government would require close to N7 trillion to achieve a nationwide standard gauge rail track network.
As the Federal Government pushes for the completion of the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge, it has also delivered on the Ajaokuta-Itakpe-Warri standard gauge rail tracks (Nigeria’s first standard gauge rail tracks, the construction of which started in 1983 to service the Ajaokuta Steel Rolling Mills).
This project was delivered in October 2017 with skeletal commercial activity running on the tracks as the Federal Government aggressively pursues the completion of the 12 train stations earmarked for the corridor as the government tweaks the original plan from a solely industrial line to serve industrial, commercial and passenger traffic.
The remodeling of the line has also introduced a new mix- the desire to link the line with Abuja, on one hand and the proposed linkage of the line from Warri to the Onne Deep Sea Port, as one proposed component to be handled by Private Sector Partners on a PPP arrangement.
As work progresses on that flank, the Federal Government also completed the engineering drawing of the Coastal Rail line from Lagos to Calabar, which proposes to connect virtually all the capitals on the southern part of the country, with a slip into the eastern line via Enugu, which would connect the South eastern states.
The Lagos-Kano rail line is also to connect to Katsina and to Daura, from where it would connect Maradi, in Niger Republic, which would have ensured the coordinated economic route which connects the port city of Lagos to the landlocked neighbouring countries within the Sahel which has always looked the other way to service their massive import desires.
While the Federal Government aggressively pursues the modernisation project, it also attempted a concession arrangement for the modernisation of the narrow gauge.
Sadly however, the concession, which was handed over to General Electric, the American conglomerate, ran into stormy waters, and GE which had earlier intended to inject 200 wagons and 50 locomotives to drive the administration’s privatization mantra on the narrow gauge, ditched the contract in 2018.
As political campaigns drew closer, the Federal Government’s strides in the railway sub-sector of the economy became drawn into the mix with the minister anxious to prove that the administration is willing to beat a path that is uncommon to the nation’s infrastructure development by being the first to deliver such a huge project as the $1.6 billion Lagos-Ibadan Standard Gauge within the three-year time frame.
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Though Ameachi failed in his bid to see President Buhari inaugurate the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge rail project in May last year, his strides were bold enough to ensure his enlistment into the cabinet for a second term.
Ostensibly to “continue the good works” he has started on the train modernisation and to ensure the timely delivery of same as well as the consolidation of the initiative with the commencement of similar projects.
Also of note is the delivery of a wagon assembly plant at Kajola, in Ogun State, from where wagons needed to feed the cargo component of the narrow and standard gauge train services are to be assembled.
The assembly plant, which is the first of such investments by the Chinese Corporation on the African continent, would eventually become a train service hub not only for the EECOWAS sub-region but the African continent. The factory would assemble all classes of wagons – flat, tanker, containerised and open wagons as well as locomotives.
Also bequeathed to Nigeria by the CCECC consortium is a University of Transportation, an exclusive institution for the training of manpower to man the rail systems and other modes of transportation and auxiliary services provided by the industry.
The university, which would begin to operate in Daura, Katsina State in 2022, would receive a $50 million takeoff grant from CCECC. Both components – the factory and the University of Transportation—come at no cost to Nigerian taxpayers.
As Nigerians ushered in year 2020, one ministry from which result is expected is the Federal Ministry of Transportation where Rotimi Amaechi has promised to deliver to them the 157-kilometre long Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge rail track for inauguration and commercial activity.
The flag-off of the Ibadan –Kano Standard Gauge rail tracks, according to him, will signal the commencement of the Ibadan to Kano, which is Lot III, marking the end of the modernisation agenda on the western line. The project, which is billed to begin in May, will be completed in 2023.
Though the Rotimi Amaechi scorecard may well be etched on his performance in the rail sub-sector for which Nigerians are very proud, experts asserted that he might also need to help deliver on the much needed transportation policy, which has continued to elude successive administration, as well as deliver on the transport sector reform bills which were at various stages in the National Assembly.
These bills would strengthen the government’s capacity to drive the needed change in the transportation sector and enable especially the railway sector play its role as the backbone of transportation services effectively.
“When all these bills are passed, the Federal Government will be left to focus on technical and economic regulations of the sector,” Amaechi said.
Amaechi’s desire, ultimately, is to drive improved GDP. The last time transportation sector contributed to the nation’s GDP was in 2016 when it contributed a paltry 4.0 per cent to the GDP. The minister is looking forward to the sector hitting two digits this year.
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