By Cross Udo, Abuja
Vice President Kashim Shettima yesterday launched the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI) asset restoration programme as part of ongoing efforts by the administration of President Bola Tinubu to restore and revive the nation’s industrial and agricultural capacity.
The programme, led by NASENI, seeks to restore over 26,000 broken but serviceable heavy-duty machines and repurpose nearly 500,000 component scraps that have been lying idle across the country.
Speaking during the launch of the programme at the Borno State Agricultural Mechanisation Farm Centre in Maiduguri, the Vice President stated that the objective of the programme is to reduce waste, cut unnecessary spending, and drive national development through localised innovation and sustainable asset management.
Shortly after commissioning the National Asset Restoration Programme, VP Shettima proceeded to Borno State University, where he commissioned a power infrastructure project executed by the Niger Delta Power Holding Company Limited (NDPHC).
The power project implemented under the Distribution Intervention Projects includes a 1×7.5MVA, 33/11KV injection substation, 3 km of 33KV line, 2.5 km of 11KV line, and 2.5 km of low-tension (LT) line, and three numbers. 500KVA distribution transformers.
The Vice President, in a statement by his spokesman, Stanley Nkwocha, was quoted as saying: “For so long, we have been profiled as a nation with poor maintenance culture. This dysfunction cuts across both the private and public sectors, and we owe it to ourselves to say: enough is enough.”
Shettima reaffirmed that the President Tinubu administration is committed to building a productive, self-reliant, and diversified economy, with strategic investments in infrastructure, innovation, and local capacity at the core of that transformation.
“This initiative is a response to our cross-generational dilemma about what to do with abandoned and poorly maintained assets of the nation—of the people. It’s a powerful shift in how we think about value, sustainability, and innovation,” the Vice President said.
He stressed the need to have a national inventory of value waiting to be unlocked. As such, “We must commend NASENI for stepping forward with this brilliant idea to mitigate a national tragedy.”
The Vice President also noted NASENI’s contributions to national development through technology transfer, local engineering, and adaptive innovation, especially in areas such as compressed natural gas (CNG) retrofitting, renewable energy, and agricultural mechanisation.
“We can’t create durable Nigerian solutions to Nigerian problems unless we localise global technologies. Relevant agencies must be supported to point us towards a stabler nation and a promising future,” the Vice President said.
Praising the leadership of NASENI’s Executive Vice Chairman, Khalil Suleiman Halilu, the Vice President noted that the agency’s renewed direction is marked by “vision, urgency, and clarity of purpose.
“The direction NASENI is headed is one driven by action, impact, innovation, and awareness of what the nation needs,” he said.
VP Shettima also called for public cooperation in safeguarding the assets that will be restored, explaining that these resources belong to the Nigerian people.
Earlier, the Governor of Borno State, Prof Babagana Zulum, recalled that under the stewardship of Vice President Shettima as Governor of Borno State, 1,000 tractors and implements were procured, along with 1,000 units of planters, 250 units each of groundnut diggers, fertiliser broadcasters, rotators, and bailers, as well as 25 units of combined harvesters, which is the single largest agricultural machinery investment in the state’s history.
Zulum noted that Nigeria requires a minimum of 750,000 functional tractors to meet its agricultural needs, yet less than 10 per cent of that number are currently operational across the country.
On his part, the Executive Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of NASENI, Halilu, stated that the Agency’s national survey revealed that Nigeria has over 47,000 broken-down or serviceable agricultural and law enforcement assets, adding that the cost to replace them will exceed N14 trillion.
“But at NASENI, we asked a simple question. Why replace them when we can restore them? With the right engineering, the right people and the right partnership, we found that we can recover these assets for just 15 to 25 per cent of their replacement value and still achieve full functionality.
“That is over N10 trillion in national savings while restoring productivity, jobs and security on the ground. That is the power of engineering, and that is the promise of NASENI.
“This programme is one more step in our mission to keep innovation at the heart of governance, whether it is through clean energy, mechatronics or domestication of advanced technologies. NASENI is showing that Nigerian problems can have Nigerian engineering solutions,” he said.
Additionally, Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari, stated that the launch of the programme marked a defining moment in the ministry’s efforts to restore productivity to the core of public service delivery across all sectors.
He added that the National Asset Restoration Programme is a cross-cutting effort led by NASENI aimed at rehabilitating, optimising, and returning government-owned equipment, infrastructure, and technology to a fully operational condition, whether agricultural, industrial, or technological.
