Nigerian Railways Re-commence Freight Wagon Operations At Lagos Ports
The District Manager, Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) Mr Jerry Oche has said that the corporation has re-commenced the freight wagon operations from Lagos port to other parts of the country.
Oche made the disclosure in an interview when the first freight wagon was leaving Lagos to Zaria yesterday.
According to him, the Corporation ran the first long haul freight wagon after a long period of time.
“The last time we had the long haul freight wagon was before the Convid-19, while the freight wagon left Lagos to Zaria for more than a year now.
” What you are witnessing this afternoon is a movement of first long train from Lagos District office to Zaria.
“We have 6, 000 industrial pipe 0n ground going to Zaria and if we calculate how many pipe per a wagon, we will be calculating over 27 train to exhaust it.
“It has been long we have embarked on this kind of journey but we might have to stop them when it gets dark.
“Hopefully by Friday or Saturday due to the stop over they might encounter, they should be able to arrive at Zaria,” Oche said.
He said that the corporation had already sent two trains, one at Ibadan and the other at Minna ahead of the freight wagon to patrol the line.
The Lagos District Manager also said they also engaged the maintenance staff to check if the engine is faulty and a senior staff who would be feeding them with report while on movement.
He said that the corporation had commenced Apapa Shuttle of carriage of consignment from the ports, while pleading with port users to patronise them to end gridlock in the port environment.
He said before the Convid-19, the corporation freighted 19 wagons of consignment which means that they had taken off 19 trucks off the road, saying the train that just left to Zaria was 16 wagons.
Oche said Lagos District office had 6 rakes of which is 19 wagon, only one had gone to Zaria now and other five are still available to port patronage.
Oche, however, sought-after port operators collaboration to improve document processing to enable them embark on many trips as possible to decongest the port and reduce gridlock.
