FREE TRAIN RIDE: NRC TRANSPORTS 63,000 PASSENGERS IN ONE WEEK
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By Sefiu Ajape
The Managing Director of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), Mr Fidet Okhiria, has revealed that the corporation transported over 63,000 passengers on the free train rides across the country between Dec. 21 and Dec 26.
During the Thursday end-of-year media engagement in Lagos, Okhiria made this statement.
He commended the Federal Government for launching the free rail travel program, which will run for 15 days. He also mentioned that over 63,000 passengers have benefited from the program thus far on all of its routes.
“Our Minister has given us an assignment to ensure that we can move the passengers and freight train between Lagos and Kano.
“We are working on it in-house, and we are trying our best to ensure we complete the tracks by the end of December.
”As we speak, a locomotive and wagon have arrived in Minna successfully, and by Saturday, Dec. 30, we will be able to move the wagon to Kaduna.
“We have also moved the wagon from Kano to Kaduna. We have some security challenges close to Kaduna; luckily, the military and police are supporting us to ensure that we are able to complete the track between Minna and Kaduna in the next five days,” Okhiria said.
By January, he added, the company would start train operations in the country’s north and provide skeletal service along the track.
In addition to stating that they had just replaced the vandalized clipper between Mokua and Kano on Wednesday, Okhiria acknowledged that they were having vandalism problems.
“We had an issue with Warri-Itakpe track earlier the year, we were able to recover, and now we have commenced full operation along the axis,” he said.
He added that the laying of tracks from Port-Harcourt to Maiduguri was ongoing.
“The contractor told me that in 15 days, the track between Port-Harcourt and Aba will be ready.
”The technical department are working on the rolling track, by the time we occupy the track, it will not be easy to vandalize again,” he said.
According to Okhiria, the NRC intended to extend the Standard Gauge train’s turnaround time in 2024 between Lagos-Ibadan, Warri-Itakpe, and Abuja-to Kaduna.
He stated that because the government made sure to help Nigerians, there was no increase in rail tickets either before or after the subsidy removal.
Okhiria said that the Federal Government had been assisting the corporation to ensure that more people could utilize the trains.
The train, according to him, is the most affordable and secure mode of transportation.
“The free train that we are running now, the government is providing money for fuel, security and other logistics to ensure we meet the demands of Nigerians during the festive period,” Okhiria said.
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