• Sets new deadline for project
The Federal Government has set April 2020 as the new deadline for the completion of the $1.6bn Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge rail project.
This is even as it indicated the desire to demolish more buildings in Mushin area of Lagos in order to accommodate the Lagos-Ibadan rail project.
The Honourable Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Ameachi, while speaking to journalists in Moniya, Ibadan, Oyo State during a monthly inspection on Saturday said the deadline of the completion of standard gauge project has been rescheduled till April 2020.
Ameachi said: “We will be out of this place latest by April 2020. We are no longer giving ourselves the time, the contractors are the ones giving us the time.
“The initial contract was from Ebute-Metta but because we wanted it to end at the seaports, we extended it and that is where the challenges are.
“The fact is that they can get to Ebute-Metta soon but getting there without getting to Apapa will not achieve much because we need to clear the gridlock and the easiest way to do it is to get the track to seaport, that way, cargoes will be loaded to wagons and taken to Ibadan and thank God we have gotten contract for Ibadan-Kano, as soon as we get the money, we will start work and the gridlock will be cleared.”
Ameachi also added that: “We will all agree that there is a huge improvement. From the 20th of December when we will carry out the next inspection, we will get to this place which means that focus will no longer be on the track but on the completion of the stations and communication and signal. Once we get communication and signalling, we are out of Lagos-Ibadan.”
On what has delayed the project, he stated that, “we are dealing with urban renewal, we are building new flyovers, overhead bridges, underpasses, pipes, sewage and we pray that we don’t meet it in Ibadan to Kano. If we will meet anything like that, it won’t be in the magnitude of Lagos because it was a total chaos and we didn’t get the kind of support we needed initially but now we have it. The support could be the people and the fact is that some people are still in court over this because lands were taken from them.
“Safety of people around rail lines across the country is important to us. This is why I have directed that buildings encroaching on the rail perimeter at Km 8.9 Ilupeju, Mushin area of the Lagos-Ibadan route be bought off, demolished and fenced out. We need space for the power lines.
“The argument is that they are willing to complete the stations but the equipment have not arrived from China and our argument is that they should get some things from Nigeria. Before they wanted to import glasses and doors as if we don’t have them in Nigeria.
“They said by the time we come for inspection on the 20th of December, the track will get to Ibadan and the issue will now be the completion of stations, communications and signalling so that we can commence test running on the 30th of November. We don’t have enough coaches and locomotives but we will start with as many as we can take pending when the 20 locomotives that we imported arrive. They will arrive end of December or the latest second week in January 2020.”
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