The Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amaechi, on Thursday, stated that the Muhammadu Buhari administration will not ‘abandon the good ideas’ of the Goodluck Jonathan administration or that of previous governments.

Amaechi, a former governor of Rivers state, said this while inspecting the Abuja-Kaduna Rail Project at Idu, Abuja.

The minister further stated that N150 billion is to be used for the execution of the rail project, saying that N60 billion was budgeted for the Lagos-Kano standard gauge and Lagos-Calabar project each.

Amaechi said: “What we are doing is implementation of what we met in office. We are not among those who will abandon good ideas. If we see an idea that is good, we will adopt it. The Lagos-Kano project was awarded by former President Olusegun Obasanjo and we are flying with it.”

“The Lagos-Calabar project was awarded by former President Goodluck Jonathan and we are also flying with it. What we are doing is implementing those projects that have not been implemented for so many years.”

Amaechi, who announced that the Abuja-Kaduna rail project was complete and would be launched in May, also said that President Buhari would test-run the rail project in March.

“The essence of my tour is to enable us assess whether we are ready for commercial activities and I think we are. I will be travelling from Abuja to Kaduna tomorrow through the rail.”

“In March, they should start the test-run of the rail services for free, then the proper commercial activity will start in May, where we expect the President to flag-off the use of coaches.”

“The Abuja light rail is expected to start from Abuja and de-board passengers at Idu from where such passengers will move to Kaduna but since the Abuja light rail is not ready, we shall use their tracks to continue to pick passengers from Abuja until they are ready and then we will disengage the temporary facility.”

“The role of the station is to convey passengers to Idu, where they will be transferred to the national rail line to proceed to Kaduna.”

The problem, Amaechi says is: “We need to fence the lines to prevent animals from crossing the rail.”

“The tracks are finished and the signalling at Idu is also completed but the major problem we have is fencing and it is because of the peculiar nature of our culture.

“Because of our culture, we have to fence and we are going to spend close to $100 million to fence the tracks from Abuja to Kaduna just because we have to protect the railway from animals and human crossing. “The train currently goes at the speed of 60 to 70 kilometres per hour for fear of humans and animals crossing the rail; by the time we start commercial activities, we must secure its path.

“We will be running on 120 to 150 kilometres when the trains go commercial; that speed cannot accommodate human and animals crossing the rail, so to protect human beings and animals, we are going ahead with the fencing.”

“I have told the construction company that they will need to build a Railway Academy, where experts will be employed to train Nigerians on how to operate the standard gauge. Nigeria is not a dumping ground for technology; you cannot dump technology on us unless you bring the technology with the expertise.”

Mazi Emeka