Why Minister is unhappy with work on Lagos-Ibadan rail

Despite the 90 percent completion claim by the engineers, the Minister of Transport,

The $1.6 billion project — a deal with China — is expected to be commissioned by President Muhammadu Buhari in December 2018. The federal government has already paid N72 billion counterpart funding.

But, during an inspection of the project, Amechi expressed displeasure over the lack of stations along the route -- a situation he blamed on the slow pace of work by the contractor, China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC).

The contractor, however, blamed the slow pace of work on the rains while promising an improvement in a few weeks.

"Did anyone notice that there are no stations? That means the can't operate despite the laying of tracks," Amaechi said.

When asked if he was satisfied with the pace of work on the project, the minister replied: “No, I am not satisfied. But they have a reason. The problem is the rain. The work is progressing. You will agree with us that we are progressing. The problem is the rain. There is no way they would have gone extra with the rains.

“At the meeting, they agreed that now that the rains are stopping, there will be an improvement. Their fear, however, is that in the next one or two weeks, the rains may come but immediately after that, the work will pick up faster. One and a half years is the original time for the construction of the stations but we have insisted that they will finish it before December," the minister added

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Amaechi noted that rail tracks had been laid through a distance of about 12km, but stressed that he was not impressed with this development.

“They (CCECC) have been able to lay 12km, as against the 1.3km that was laid the last time we visited. We are still not impressed with the level of work. Their argument is that the track laying is not the problem as they can lay as many tracks as possible any day. They said the problem is earthwork. They said if the rains stopped, they could conclude the earthwork which is at 90 per cent.

“The remaining 10 per cent is between Iju to Ajaokuta. They said if the rains stopped, they would finish the remaining 10 per cent faster. They also said by the end of September, they would have finished all the bridges between Iju and Ajeokuta but we are pushing that the contract is between Ebute Meta and Ibadan and should be finished by December,” he declared.

President Buhari is expected to ride on the train from Lagos to Ibadan before the 2019 general elections.