Abuja — On 17th May, 2019, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, Minister of Transportation, on behalf of the federal government, issued an award for a $3.9billion contract to link Abuja (Idu) with the Itakpe-Warri rail line. The facility would terminate at the Warri Sea Port. The contract scope includes the construction of a new deep sea port in Warri, and is scheduled to be completed in 2024. You will forgive Nigerians if they are unable to appreciate the revolutionary significance of this step: they have heard innumerable pronouncements by politicians in government that ended up as a pipe dream.
If you recall that similar public cynicism greeted and trailed the first ground-breaking step in rail transport infrastructure by Mr. Amaechi a few years ago, specifically with respect to the award of the double track, standard gauge Lagos-Ibadan sector of the Lagos-Kano rail initiative, you will understand perhaps, why this audacious Abuja-Itapke-Warri standard gauge contract award is drawing everything but public celebrations. When he announced the award in 2016, as he did in this recent pronouncement, there were actually public jeer and cynical dismissal of the administration's ploy to 'spend its way out of recession.'
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