By Ben Adoga, Abuja
Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, yesterday registered his anger over the slow pace of work at the central and Kukwaba metro rail stations, stating that he will not tolerate excuses.
The Minister disclosed when he inspected the metro train stations in the Central Business District and Kukwaba in Piwoyi district.
Wike stated that he was unhappy with the state of insecurity at the Central station and the engineering design of the Kukwaba station, adding that the contractors will have to work round the clock to be able to ensure the delivery of the project by the given deadline of May 24.
Speaking with the press after the tour, Wike said: “This is one project that I am very passionate about, and you know that Mr. President gave me a directive that must not be taken for granted. Therefore, we have to come and make sure that things are in good shape.
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“When we first visited the metro station, I discovered that they are many security lapses and I remember after our inauguration, I did say that we have to work on the issue of security by putting on the fence around the metro station to ward off criminals but unfortunately, that has not been done.
“To my surprise, it was discovered that the contract was not even awarded to CCECC, it is a different contractor entirely and this is my first time of hearing that and we are going to take it up immediately to see that it is put in place.”
He went further, “We can’t talk of operation when we have not taken the issue of security seriously. Security for us is key.
“We have to also talk about the kind of vandalisation and stealing that is going on there. We have security companies that were awarded contracts to secure those areas, yet things are happening, excuses are being given on how security agencies release those that are caught but for me, that is not enough and we are going to make sure that we have a different method to be adopted, we can’t continue to give excuses every day.
“I cannot be happy, if in May this year we are not able to operate this metro station, it will be very disastrous for me. Even in all these stations, from what I have seen, the designs are very poor. Who may have approved the design is unfair to Nigerians. I have told CCECC that these designs are not even acceptable in their country.
“Be that as it may, we have to work round the clock to see that we achieve our result. I have also directed that all the stations must be cleared and also all the necessary things must be provided, there’s no room for excuses at all.
“So I’m not happy, the company must speed up, those who are doing the access roads must also speed up,” Wike said.
While responding to whether this occurrence puts the May 29 deadline in jeopardy, he said, “I’m not a pessimist but also I doubt and I believe that putting all our energies, we may achieve it.
“I disbursed the funds for this project on access roads so we have no excuse just that if by the time I came, I had taken time to go into all these projects, maybe we would have been able to identify some of these lapses.”
Recall that in September 2023, Wike approved the sum of N5.9bn for the fencing of the station.
The $824m Abuja light rail project was opened in July 2018 for use and was abandoned in 2020 during the COVID pandemic
