The Federal Government on Wednesday said that the promise to complete the narrow gauge Eastern railway corridor before the end of the President Muhammadu Buhari administration is no longer feasible.
The Minister of Transportation, Mu’azu Jaji Sambo, stated this while fielding questions at the end of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Recall that President Buhari had two years ago performed the groundbreaking of the $1.96 billion rail line project saying that it would stimulate economic activities in 14 states it covers.
Then Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amaechi, had said that the Port Harcourt-Maiduguri line would be delivered before the end of the tenure of the present administration.
But speaking on it during the post-FEC briefing, Sambo said financing the project has become an issue.
He said the Federal Government has not been able to obtain the foreign counterpart funding embedded in the project, making it impossible to fund it as envisaged.
He said: “The question relating to the promise to deliver the eastern line narrow gauge before the end of this administration. Now, the eastern line is the line from Port Harcourt-Maiduguri. It has been segmented in such a way that the first part of the works covers Port Harcourt to Enugu.
“Now, the truth of the matter is that if there was a promise to deliver this line before the end of this administration, this promise is no longer feasible because, when the contract was approved, it was approved on the premise that 85 per cent will be funded through a foreign loan, while 15 per cent will be the counterpart funding for the national budget.
“Since that approval, we have not been able to obtain that 85 per cent foreign loans for this project.
“We have been funding it through the national budget on the basis of the 15 per cent counterpart funding of the federal government. And therefore, funding has been a major challenge for this project.”
Sambo informed that after years of delay occasioned by various court cases, the federal government is soon to resume the dredging of the Calabar port.
He confirmed that there is a presidential directive for the immediate resumption of business at the port, saying that the Calabar Channel Management is part of the other channel managements that have existed in the Nigerian Ports Authority and its joint venture partners.
Confirmed that the legal issues in the joint venture partnership for the dredging of the port are what had led to the delay, Sambo stated: “You are aware that of the three ports (Warri, Port Harcourt and Lagos), the NPA had encountered difficulties with the JV partnership in respect to the Calabar channel dredging. This has been as a result of several litigations from both sides that the Nigerian Ports Authority had made with the joint venture partner Niger Global.”
The minister noted that the issues have now been resolved, adding: “Following the presidential intervention, the Ministry of Transportation and the Federal Ministry of Justice has been directed to put in everything they can to resolve all outstanding court cases with a view to having a full resumption of this very, very laudable project. This we are in the process and should be concluding very, very soon.”
While it is one of the oldest ports in the country, the Calabar port has been operating below its potential due to draft issues which have made it impossible for large vessels to navigate through the channel.
Port users have therefore resorted to the Lagos, Onne and Port Harcourt ports for cargo traffic that ordinarily would have berthed in Calabar.