Irked by the alarming and pathetic ate of RAIL road vandalism in the country by undesirable element in the country in recent times, a concerned Nigerian citizen, politician, academician and a new breed presidential ASPIRANT in person of Prof Christopher Imumolen late last year wrote an open letter to his fellow Nigerans decrying the high rate of RAIL VANDALISM
IN HIS WORDS “My attention has been drawn to a video of an inspection exercise to one of the country’s newly constructed rail projects which has been identified as the Warri-Itakpe-Ajaokuta rail, where it was discovered that some wicked elements have been vandalizing the rail tracks, obviously for the purpose of stealing and reselling them.
“I am indeed saddened by the video, which has now gone viral, and this development has left me wondering if we, as Nigerian people, are indeed ready for the better life that we are desperately in need of”
THE Presidential aspirant went on further to ask if it make sense that structures built on huge foreign loans are being destroyed by the same people who bear the brunt of the burden of loans on the economy? How will the country ever come out of these loans when its investments meant to last a century are rendered dilapidated before they start to yield returns?
“We need to stop short-changing ourselves as citizens of this great country. Yes, we must continue to demand honest and responsible leadership from our politicians and public office holders, but in the same vein, we must offer ourselves as responsible followers”
And in line with a way out to cut future occurrence in such notorious vandalism, the Managing Director of Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), Engr . Fidet Okhiria, has stated categorically that the corporation has provided a mechanism to stop railway vandalism and assured passengers of maximum standards.
In a press conference stage at the boardroom of the NRC Headquarters yesterday Okhiria gave the guarantee of means put in place to halt such future incident
He said that NRC management had begun to sensitize all communities along rail corridors about the implications of vandalizing rail equipment.
According to him, the Ministry of Transportation has also provided six patrol vehicles to help security operations ensure swift action.
“We know that the vehicle cannot go out on the track and we are now making arrangements to provide a motorcycle to patrol the tracks.
“What we see now in the corridor of the road is that people arrive even with weapons, they exchange firefights with the police and civil protection.
“Vandalism along the railway is not impacting operations, our patronage continues to increase and we have advised all train operators not to stop during movement.
“We also educate train operators not to stop even when they see someone lying on the train tracks because they don’t know what they are planning.
“We are in contact with various security authorities to provide the necessary cover for the corporation,” Okhiria said.
On the Abuja-Kaduna standard gauge rail, he said they are teaming up with the Air Force to patrol with helicopters, adding that the NRC was also looking inward for advanced technology.
The NRC chief explained that they were working on advanced technology, which would come at a high cost and with components such as satellite monitoring and runway sensors that would not be prone to vandalism.
Okhiria said Abuja was getting a lot of patronage on a daily basis due to the introduction of electronic tickets, adding that Lagos-Ibadan patronage was also increasing.
Okhiria said that the corporation had discovered some problems with the road leading to the Apapa port and that the contractor had returned to the site.
He assured cargo operators that the Apapa standard container train would begin full operation in March 2022.
It is the wish and hope all well-meaning Nigerians that such vandalism ends so as to make our train rides peaceful, joyful devoid of any iota of fear during any rail trip
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