Federal government on Wednesday approved various infrastructure contracts, including the rehabilitation and reconstruction of the Port Harcourt-Maiduguri eastern narrow guage railway, with new branch lines and trans-shipment facilities, at the cost of $3,020,279,549.
Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi disclosed this while briefing after the virtual meeting of the Federal Executive Council FEC, presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Amaechi revealed that FEC also approved the construction of a new deep seaport in Bonny, under PPP and the construction of a railway Industrial park in Port Harcourt.
The Minister who disclosed that the railway line will be at the cost of $3,020,279,549, added that the industrial park, being executed under a Public, Private partnership PPP, arrangements, is ” at no cost to federal government, but will cost $241,154,389.31.
” The Bonny deep seaport which will cost $461,924,369, is at no cost to the federal government” he said.
The Port Harcourt to Maiduguri narrow guage railway is expected to have new branch lines, from Port Harcourt to Bonny and from Port Harcourt to Owerri
” There’s another connecting to narrow guage to standard guage at Kafanchan. There is a branch line from Gombe or before Maiduguri to Damaturu and Gashau. That’s what has been approved” he said.
Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola, while also briefing, said the Council also approved the full business skills compliance certificate issued by Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission, ICRC, Abuja, for the design, finance, upgrade, operate, and transfer of the Nigeria Correctional Service Shoe, Garment, and Leather Processing Factory located in Aba
Abia State as well as Janguza, Kano State under a Public Private Partnership (PPP).
He disclosed that the full business skills certificate and the investment will cost N5.1bn.
No fewer than 1,330 people are expected to have direct employment, while about 3,000 people will have indirect employment.
“The benefit beside the employment of Nigerians is the opportunity for training of the inmates of our correctional facilities in Janguza, Kano State and Aba in Abia State.
The contract for full business skills compliance certificate is given to Msssrs LG Investment Limited, a Nigerian company which is partnering with a Chinese company, Full Technology Incorporated from Beijing, China.
Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, revealed that FEC approved contract for the Ministry of Federal Capital Territory Administration for the award of contract for the final design of engineering infrastructure and production of tendered documents for Kabusa district phase three of the FCT, Abuja an area of about 850 hectares which will be mixed use of both private and government, residential and offices.
It was approved for the sum of N183, 709, 480, 50k to Messrs Techno Engineering and Consult Limited.
Also FEC approved contract for the Ministry of Aviation for the rehabilitation of various screening machines nationwide at the cost of N654 million.
The project is part of the new protocol sanctioned by the IATA, on the back of the COVID-19 pandemic
“Aviation authorities have now come up with new protocols in our airports which entails more of social distancing. So you need more points to screen passengers and their luggages. So this is what has necessitated for the rehabilitation of those screening machines that have broken down”
The Ministry of Works and Housing, also got appro for the completion of the rehabilitation of the Abeokuta-Ibadan road, a distance of 72 kilometers.
This followed a memo requesting for the project’s augmentation by N788 million to bring the project cost to N4.78 billion plus six months extention time for construction.
“So we hope that by 2021, this road will be completed. You need to note also that this was a contract that was awarded in 2010 but due to paucity of funds and other constraints, we have to take it over” he said.
Mohammed disclosed that the Secretary to the Government of the Federation SGF on behalf of Mr. President also presented a memo which was approved seeking Council’s approval for the purchase of 21 operational vehicles for the Federal Road Safety Corps in favour of Messrs Pan Nigeria Ltd in total sum of N292, 615 million.
” The purpose of the memo is to enhance the operational capability and capacity of the Corps so that we can stop the carnage on our roads and also secure our roads better.
“The unique thing about this memo is that these vehicles are being sourced from one of our local assemble plants, Peugeot Nigeria Ltd in Kaduna”
Industry, Trade and Investment, Adeniyi Adebayo, who briefed on behalf of his Ministry, disclosed that FEC also approved contract for the procurement and installation of automative electronic equipment, for the automatic mechatronic center facilities in six geo-political zones of the country and the FCT, at the cost of N1.8b
According to him, ” the three pilot workshop automotive service hops for the National Automative Design and Development Council (NADDC) at the cost for maintenance of vehicles. N1.8 billion.
“The NADDC has recorded a lot of success in bringing back assembling and manufacturing operations in the automotive sector. As a result of this, the proposed training centers will not only train Nigerians to maintain and service vehicles but will also ensure avoidable disasters arising from lack of skills by our teaming youth will be prevented, through periodic training and empowerment at an affordable cost.
“The whole idea is that with the kind of vehicles being manufactured today, we need training institutes that will train our Mechanics and our youths how to maintain and service these vehicles.
