TheCable

Rotimi Amaechi, minister of Transportation, says Kano state will house the biggest rail station in the country.

Amaechi said this in Abuja on Monday when a delegation led by Abdullahi Ganduje, governor of Kano, visited him to discuss the rail and inland dry port (IDP).

Inland dry ports, also known as Inland Container Deports (ICD’s) or Containers Freight Stations (CFS) is equivalent to a seaport located in the hinterland.

The ports receive containers by rail or road from the seaport for examination and clearance by customs and other competent authorities — with all the loading and off-loading equipment needed to handle containers.

In Nigeria, Kano is one of the seven locations approved for the construction of inland dry ports, which were concessioned to private sector operators by the ICD implementation committee of the federal ministry of transport.

The others locations include; IsialaNgwa, Aba; Erunmu, Ibadan; Heipang, Jos; Zamfarawa, Funtua; Jauri, Maiduguri; and ICNL, Kaduna.

”We have two major projects we want to do in Kano, the first being the standard gauge from Kano to Kaduna. We are applying to Kano State Government to give us land to build the biggest station in Nigeria. It is the biggest station because we are combining two rail lines,” NAN quoted the minister as saying.

”The first is the Kano-Maradi, which will empty in Kano and then the second one is Kano –Kaduna, which will also empty in Kano. Don’t forget the station we are building in Kano will be the station that will take passengers from Lagos to Kano.

“If you combine Kano-Maradi and Lagos-Kano, you will know that the volume of passengers you will get in a week will be about a million passengers.”

According to the minister, there will be an expansion in the concept of the Kano station, which is largely the same framework as the Lagos station but has more space.

He noted that the visit of the Kano delegation was also an opportunity to deliberate on the Dala IDP, which was already at the advanced stage.

Amaechi said the ministry’s delegation would on March 5, visit the site to ascertain the level of work and how further to support the realisation of the project.

Earlier, Ganduje said that the state government had contributed about N2.5 billion to the dry port project to ensure its speedy completion and commercialisation.

“We are investing about N2.5billion, we are providing access road, we are providing also other social amenities just to contribute our quota. That project was conceived 20 years ago but never materialised until during our time,” he said.

“So, I [want to] make sure that this project is a reality and to do that we have to provide enabling environment to contribute our own quota.

“So, we are happy with the developers because they have gone far and we are happy with the honourable minister of transportation because he has given maximum cooperation in assisting to see that the Kano State Dala IDP is a reality.”

The governor further noted that the project would lead to economic development not only for Kano and its neighbouring states.

Abubakar Bawuro, chairman, Dala IDP, said everything had been put in place to ensure the speedy completion, viability and use of the dry port.

NAN reported that over N5 billion had been sunk into the Dala inland dry port.