Rotimi Amaechi
Nigeria’s federal government on Friday announced that it had completed the repairs of the Abuja-Kaduna rail track that was bombed by terrorists last Wednesday.
The Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, announced this after inspecting the facility and stated that train services would resume on the route from Saturday, October 23, 2021.
He also stated that the government was already working to apprehend those who bombed the facility, stressing that he would meet with the Department of State Services and the Nigerian Army on the matter.
“The repair work is completed. What is significant is that the repair was done by our Nigerian engineers and completed in record time. They moved in today (Friday) and finished today and by tomorrow (Saturday), we expect that the first train will run on the track,” Amaechi said.
The minister said the procurement of digital systems would be fast-tracked in order to enhance the security network on the railway.
He said: “The essence of the digital security system is to enable us to know when there is an impact on the rail. There is a sensor, when people cross the rail or do anything, we will be able to know and we will be able to forestall this kind of attack.
“We will get the police to be involved so that they will be here before we install the digital security system. I am happy that our people fixed it.
“I am not happy that the security breach took place but what it has done is that it has shown that we actually have the capacity to fix our rail.
“We want to assure the public that beyond the physical presence of police and deployment of the military along this track, I just told the Managing Director, NRC to get us a rail bus that will be on patrol regularly on the tracks so that we can see what is going to happen even before the train takes off. That will be the measure we will adopt until we put a digital system in place. It will be end to end, from Abuja to Kaduna and it will be the same on the Lagos-Ibadan line.”
The Abuja-Kaduna train track was bombed on Wednesday and services were suspended by the Nigerian Railway Corporation to ensure that it was fixed.
Kasim Sumaina in Abuja
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