Tag Archives: Abuja rail

Obasanjo Awarded Abuja Rail Project Without Design, MOU- Senate Panel

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Former President Olusegun Obasanjo awarded the Abuja Rail Project in 2007 with neither a design nor a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), according to the Senate Committee on Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
The then Minister of FCT and current governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, was said to have signed the contract based on an uncalculated estimate.

The revelation came as the committee discovered the contract, which stood at 60.67 kilometres, was inflated by $10 million (about N2 billion at N200 per dollar) per kilometre even as the length was later reduced to 45 kilometres without the refund of the cost for the 15.67 kilometres dropped.

To this end, the Senate committee, led by Dino Melaye has demanded the refund of the of $195,878,296.74 ( about N392 billion at N200 per dollar) being the amount for the 15.67 kilometres cut out from the Chinese Civil Engineering Construction Company (CCECC), handling the project.

The Project Manager of the company, Etim Abak, who answered questions from members of the committee when they undertook an oversight assignment to the project site, said the contract was signed by the then FCT minister without design and MOU, saying it was carried out based on what he simply identified as a conceptual design.

“The contract was awarded based on a conceptual design and estimates were not properly done. There was no formal design submitted and rail bridges and crossover bridges were not captured in the contract, “he told the committee.

According to him, the contract sum was $841.645,898 and project completion period was 48 months while the scope of work was 60.67km standard gauge, with double railway tracks and associated permanent way within FCT.

Melaye , who alleged the whole project may be shrouded in fraud, wondered why the project, whose length initially stood at 60.67 kilometres was later reduced to 45.245 without cut in the cost of the project initially paid for.

Credit: Guardian

Abuja Rail To Commence Operation December 2017 – FCT Minister

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The FCT Minister, Malam Muhammad Bello has said that the Abuja rail would begin operation in Dec. 2017.

 

Bello stated this while receiving the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources and Group Managing Director of the NNPC Dr Emmanuel Ibe Kachichwu, who paid him a working visit on Monday in Abuja.

 

He said the commencement of the rail operation would complement the present mode of public transportation and reduce traffic gridlock often experienced at peak periods in the Federal Capital Territory.

 

“The FCT Administration is assiduously working to make the Abuja rail system operational in the last quarter of 2017. When the Abuja rail comes on stream, it will revolutionise the transportation system, as the use of personal vehicles would become unattractive,’’ he said.

 

The minister said that the rail transportation would also go a long way to create employment for some residents of the FCT.

 

He, however, called on the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation to build Mega Filling Stations in the six area councils of the FCT.

“Instead of only one earmarked for each senatorial district in the 36 states of the federation, a large population of the territory resides in the area councils and satellite towns. Citing mega filling stations in the area councils will definitely reduce pressure on the stations in the Federal Capital City,” he said.

 

Bello promised that he would provide good locations in the headquarters of the six area councils for the mega filling stations.

 

According to him, the FCT administration is prepared to go into partnership with the NNPC by giving it befitting and strategic plots of land for the stations, in exchange for equity share in the business.

 

Earlier, Kachichwu said the NNPC was planning to construct additional mega filling stations in all the senatorial districts of the country, in partnership with the states.

 

He said that 15 state governors had already indicated interest by providing plots of land for the project.

 

He called on the FCT Minister to key into the scheme by making available plots of land for the purpose.

 

 

(NAN)