THE China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation CCECC has been accused of purposely delaying the construction of the Kano-Kaduna Railway.
The Minister of Transportation Mr. Rotimi Amaechi said this at the inspection of the Kano-Kaduna railway project yesterday adding that the CCECC was playing politics urged them to focus on the construction and completion of the Kano-Kaduna railway.
“I think the CCECC is beginning to play politics, they should move away from politics and focus on construction and think that they need to complete the Kaduna-Kano rail, I will not say more than this until I meet with them on Wednesday.”
The Minister also lamented the speed of work is extremely slow, adding that only five hundred and forty of the two thousand equipment has been brought to site.
Mr. Amaechi said he will be meeting with the CCECC on Wednesday to further discuss issues bordering on construction.
“The speed is extremely slow, the equipment that is supposed to be 2000 plus equipment, all they have brought so far is 541.
“They claim that over three hundred is in Kaduna , people have gone to check that but even if you add all that it is about 800 equipment as compared to 2000 equipment that they are supposed to bring, then something is wrong somewhere.
“I know they will claim that there is no Money, that we have not funded them, but that is not their responsibility if they want to achieve it, we will look for the Money.
“The CCECC have not brought Money, the Chinese are no longer giving us Money for more than three to four years now, so they can not afford to delay it because there is need to look for the money, that is what the Chinese do,” he said.
The Minster of Transportation Mr. Rotimi Amaechi says E ticketing For other train routes like the Lagos-Ibadan and Warri-Itakpe has reached an advanced stage.
He said the final negotiation with the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission, ICRC and team selected went successfully .
He said in the coming week the ICRC will take it up to the next stage and the ministry is targeting end of March for the launch of the E-ticketing.
On the national transport policy Mr. Amaechi said it is in the office of the vice-president,
“I was with them last week, we were proposing that if they conclude from the office of the vice president we should be able to go the cabinet before the end of April.”
On port-Harcourt-Maiduguri rail, he said: “It is part of what the CCECC will address is on because we have given them some money and we think that they should start work.
According to them they said they will start building camps . for me who is not an Engineer all those things are not my business, my business is to see the laying of tracks and other nacessary things on ground.
By ABDULLAHI RABIU, Kano
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