The Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport Nigeria (CILT) has argued that not all the states in the federation would have the population to support the investment in the light rail projects.
The National Director of CILT Nigeria, Mr. Paul Ndibe who made this known while speaking in an interview with Primetime Reporters in Lagos was reacting to call by the former President Goodluck Jonathan to the states of the federation to embark on investment in the light rail project so as to give boost to transportation of goods and people within the country.
Ndibe however stated that states that have the capacity to support the project and have the required finances to embark on such project should not hesitate to do that.
He maintained that states like Lagos, Rivers, Kano, Kaduna, Enugu and to some extent Anambra should embark on investment in the light rail project adding that states that may not have the population to support the project need not venture into such investment.
“But it might be a call for states to be alive to that sector but not for all the states to key into it. And not having a population moving, the population is for an activity level, they should match these investments with the level of activity that will come out from moving people around is what you will look at, whether it will support such investment or not”, he said.
On private investment in railways, the CILT boss observed that it was long expected adding that already, there were investments coming up at the state level even as he said that some states were doing some measure of rail investment.
He however pointed out that if the federal government could expand it to include the private sector, it would be a right step in the right direction regretting that there was no enabling law to that effect.
According to him,” The railway still operate under the Act of 1955 that allows railway operation to be under the Nigerian Railway Corporation. Although there could be MOUs under which some states or interests groups might develop the network but operation is still reserved to the Nigeria Railway Corporation”.
“And so, with the unbundling of the railway and with the railway bill already awaiting to receive that action of the National Assembly, if you unbundle it, better. Bu government should be careful, are you licensing the route or are you licensing the service? Who is the rail authority? Where do you place the security management of the track? The track bed, who maintains the track bed to ensure safety and integrity of the tracks? Because if the track is not safe, anything you put there is suspect but if the track is solid and safe, then you can determine what to do with the sector”.
He therefore advised that the government should decide whether to license the route or not as well as give them a pricing level that would go and then see how they could partner with them so that the initial services would not be too exorbitant to discourage the development of the rail sector.
