The Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) announced on Tuesday that it would suspend train services from Saturday, February 25 to Monday, February 27 for the presidential and National Assembly elections.
Mr Mahmood Yakubu, the NRC spokesperson, said that the suspension was to enable Nigerians to participate in the elections.
The train services affected are between Abuja and Kaduna, Warri and Itakpe, Lagos and Ibadan, and Iddo, Lagos, and Ijoko. Normal train services would resume on February 28.
Meanwhile, the Minister of Transportation, Mu’azu Sambo, has called for the NRC to be split up in line with the government’s current transportation reforms.
In a statement by the Director of Press and Public Relations, Henshaw Ogubike, the minister made this known during a meeting with the management team of the Ministry of Finance Incorporated (MOFI). The CEO, Dr Armstrong Takang, led the MOFI team on a visit to the minister.
The minister explained that the NRC needed restructuring and that the current reforms would improve the railway system's efficiency. According to the minister, the NRC was not functioning as efficiently as it should, and reforms and splitting up are needed.
The minister urged MOFI to push for the NRC's restructuring to make it more financially stable and still provide Nigerians with world-class services.
The NRC's suspension of train services for the elections would ensure the safety of Nigerians and create an environment for free and fair elections.
The transportation reforms aim to improve the Nigerian transportation system, and the splitting up of the NRC is one of the ways the government plans to achieve this.
“As the Minister of Transportation, I would like to see the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) split up through MOFI”. He said, “There is a Committee set up to break up NRC, and I will urge you to work with that Committee.”
Sambo also talked about the reforms done in the ports and how they have helped. He said that similar changes should be made in the railway sector.
He said, “The Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), the way it is currently, is the way the ports were prior to concession, prior to the reforms of 2005. Today, even the Nigeria Ports Authority (NPA) workers are happier about how NPA is today compared to how it was prior to the reforms. This means the reformed NPA is generating more revenues to support its operations and also support its workforce and its pensioners”.
The minister, who put people’s minds at ease about losing their jobs because of unbundling, said, “I don’t want the NRC staff to see the unbundling of the NRC as a threat to their jobs. If we have a better-performing NRC, then we are going to have better salaries for its workers, better working conditions for its workers, more revenue for the FG and therefore the ability to even build more rail networks.”
Sambo said that trespassing on railway property will soon be a thing of the past. He also noted that MOFI was berthed for a reason: for the Federal Government to take control of its assets and get the most out of them.
Ademola Adegoroye, the Minister of State for Transportation, praised the skills of Dr Armstrong, the Managing Director of MOFI, and said that he has full faith that the MOFI team will do a good job.