The Nigerian Senate has constituted an ad-hoc committee to investigate alleged growing decadence in operations of Nigerian RailWay Corporation (NRC).
This followed the adoption of a point of order, raised by Senator Abdul Ningi (PDP-Bauchi) at plenary on Thursday.
Senator Ningi citing order 42 (personal explanation) of the senate standing rules said :
“Mr President, I alerted you on the tragic history of the Nigerian railway situation, particularly, as it affects Kano and Kaduna rail lines.
“Mr. President, you will recall, like my colleagues will recall, the Nigerian railway lines between Kano, between Kaduna and Abuja was laid by the then President Goodluck Jonathan in 2015, as he was departing, the rail line was commissioned.
“And subsequently, when late President Muhammadu Buhari took over, in May 2015, he further recommissioned the lines with about five heads of cargos and about eight to ten coaches.
“From 2015, the railway started commutting ten trenches of movement, five from Abuja to Kaduna and five from Kaduna to Abuja.”
Senator Ningi said his investigation revealed that NRC was commuting 10,000 passengers in a day as at then.
“Last two weeks, I visited Kaduna with the railway and what I found and discovered was simply a tragic Nigerian story.
“I spoke with leader of the railway, that is the manager, and he rendered these statistics to me.
“First he told me they were commuting 10,000 passengers and because of the terrible nature of Kaduna -Abuja road, most people come from Kaduna to work and travel back to Kaduna.
“The 10,000 passengers they were doing a day was reduced to about 800 to 900 Passengers.
“The ten shuttling they were doing a day was reduced, Mr. President, to two times a day.
“And I was told that while the railway was working on full capacity, they were of course generating a revenue of N1.8 billion monthly,” Senator Ningi said.
He said he was at some time a sub chairman of a Commitee on SURE-P, when the then administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan injected billions of naira into the nation’s railway system.
He said Nigerian cannot as a nation continue to allow decadence of its infrastructure and scarce resources.
“Mr President, this is very disturbing it will not only disturb me it must disturb this Senate and Nigerians.
“As it looks, nobody is ready to do anything about it, without any prejudice to Senator Adams Oshiomhole’s committee that is saddled with investigating the decadence of railway system in Nigeria.
“But this particular matter I have also informed them as ad hoc committee chairman of the decay , Senator Ningi explained.
Contributing, Senator Adamu Alero (APC-Kebbi) said the NRC was facing serious revenue challenge as number of its trips had dropped from five to one.
He said the challenge in operation was also caused by destruction of coaches by bandits, saying that fund was yet to be provided to replace the damaged coaches.
Senator Alero, however, said the Federal Government was on the matter and would provide fund to revamp the railway services.
President of Senate, Senator Godswill Akpabio, who upheld the point of order, urged the ad-hoc commitee to turn in its report to plenary in six weeks.
The committee had as Chairman,Senator Adams Oshiomhole, (APC-Edo).
Other members of the commitee includes Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe (APGA Abia), Senator Osita Ngwu (PDP-Enugu), Senator Ibrahim Dankwambo, (PDP-Gombe) Senator Ede Dafinone, (APC-Delta)Senator Ireti Kingibe, (LP-FCT) among others.