The Minister of Transportation, Sen. Said Alkali has pledged a rapid and thorough response to the recent railway accident, which occurred on the 26th of August, and assured that the Abuja-Kaduna train service, which was temporarily suspended would resume soon as rehabilitation of damaged tracks would be completed in ten days.
Sen. Alkali stated this when he paid an on-site tour to the incident venue at Asham station, Kaduna on Monday, describing the incident as unfortunate.
The Minister, however, commended the swift intervention of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for ensuring that the locomotive and coaches involved were promptly cleared and repair work began immediately.
“This accident is truly unfortunate. However, I must first thank the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, for his immediate support. Since the incident occurred, he has ensured that the locomotive and coaches were cleared, and repairs began quickly on the rail line to restore operations.”
“I am here with the full team from the Ministry of Transportation, Directors of Railway and all his engineers and even the committee doing the investigation. The CCECC are here, Civil Rights Organisation, all of us are here. So that we ensure we have done justice to the investigation.
“At the time the accident occurred, the local was carrying eight locomotives. The locomotive was carrying eight coaches. We have successfully moved four out of the place as you can see. We are trying to fix the infrastructure so that we have a bigger crane, so that we can move the coaches and all the locomotives that are on the site. Inshallah, in the next 48 hours, we will be able to move all of them out of the site. And after that, if we didn’t have any weather challenge, in the next 10 days, we are going to restore the line.”
He further stated that “As you can see during my tour, what is affected by the accident is about 150 meters. So it’s not too long. We will be able to fix the sleepers, the pallets and the rail track so that we will be back to operation. It is a cardinal responsibility of government to provide welfare for its citizens.”
On the efforts to prevent such events from happening again, the minister said “the teams are doing their best to ensure that such doesn’t happen again. However, it is the outcome of the investigation that will now reveal what actually happened. Then we look at it and we ensure it didn’t happen again by the grace of God Almighty.”
The Minister also commended the Managing Director of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), Dr. Kayode Opeifa and his team, the investigation committee, the CCECC team, security agencies, and civil society representatives who actively participated in ensuring that a fair and comprehensive investigation was carried out to restore normalcy.
“The incident occurred at a rail interchange point where two trains normally cross. While it would be premature for me to comment on the precise cause, I can confirm that the Ministry of Transportation, the NRC, engineers, the investigation committee, the CCECC team, and civil society representatives are all actively involved in ensuring that a fair and comprehensive investigation is carried out.
“Furthermore, I must acknowledge the MD of CCECC and his team for their steadfast support to both the Ministry and the NRC throughout this process,” said the Minister.
“I am here with the full team from the Ministry of Transportation, the Director of Railway and all his engineers and even the committee doing the investigation. The CCECC is here, Civil Rights Organisation, all of us are here. So that we ensure we have done justice to the investigation,” said the Minister.
