Railway corporation MD says vandals, not bandits, attacked Abuja-Kaduna train

The Managing Director of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), Fidet Okhiria, says vandals and not bandits, attacked a train service along the Abuja-Kaduna corridor, Daily Trust reports.

Footage of a damaged rail track--bad enough to cause a derailment--and a blown up, smeared train, have been making the rounds on social media all through Thursday, October 21.

Fear gripped passengers on Wednesday, October 20, after an explosion led to the shutdown of the engine of the train.

The incident occurred around 8:00pm.

Earlier, former Senator Shehu Sani, who took the train, announced that the train broke down after running over an explosive planted by bandits.

Okhiria admits to Daily Trust that parts of the train track were destroyed in the attack.

He however adds that vandals may have been responsible.

The MD says an investigation is underway to unravel what really transpired.

“It’s true our rail track was damaged,” the newspaper quotes Okhiria as saying.

“So we have issues with the track and we are fixing it. We are working to resume train services and by Thursday evening, we should run if possible,” he says.

“We operated a train from Kaduna to Abuja this morning (Thursday) but we had to suspend operations due to the damaged track until we fix it,” he adds.

A backup train reportedly got to the passengers at about 12:15am, before taking them to Rigasa train station in Kaduna.

There has been an escalation of bandit attacks in Nigeria's northern region in recent times.

Most travelers have abandoned road transportation for rail, due to the incessant attacks and kidnappings by bandits, on the Abuja-Kaduna expressway.