Nigeria’s Minister of Transportation, Saidu Alkali has promised that the Kano-Katsina-Maradi rail line project will be completed by 2025.
Alkali also expressed his satisfaction with the level of work done so far by the contractors.
He spoke in Daura, Katsina State on Friday, when he led an inspection tour of the ministry to the 387-kilometre rail project awarded by former President Muhammadu Buhari.
The Minister said, “Actually I am impressed with what I have seen so far. We came all the way from Dawanau (in Kano State) to where we are (Daura, Katsina State) so that we can assess the level of the execution of the work in compliance with the specification of the contractor.”
“From Kano to here, almost all the major part of the site clearance has been done and I am pleased with what I have seen,” Alkali added.
Asked if contractor would meet the set target of the completion of the project, the Minister explained that the major work has been done and there was every tendency that they would meet the target.
On whether the original cost of the project would be readjusted to meet the current high cost of production realities, the Minister said “even the contractor should make some sacrifice to contribute his quota in the fixing of Nigeria by the Tinubu-led administration.”
The Lead Contractor, Mr. Vladislav Bystrenko, said the contract sum was $1.95 billion Dollars and that they signed contractual obligations around 2021 with the Nigerian Government.
He added that even before money was released to them, they had gone ahead with some major job of designing, land survey, and supervising the entire area of the contract.
Mr. Vladislav Bystrenko said that the government is highly serious about completing the project as of the fixed year of 2025.
The Minister also inspected the Muhammadu Buhari University of Transportation where the Vice Chancellor of the University, Prof. Adam Umar promised to begin admission into the institution in October 2023.
PR/
