The move followed the rehabilitation of the construction of the Port Harcourt-Maiduguri Eastern-Narrow-Gauge Railway.

The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Nigeria Railway Corporation, Freeborn Okhoria, disclosed this after leading the management team on an inspection of the project site in Port Harcourt on Wednesday.

According to Okhoria, “The Ministry and the NRC have been under pressure to deliver this so that the operations can start. They are working hard to ensure that very soon the operations will start.

When we leave here we are going to meet and map out the timeline when those things will be delivered.

“The point machines are going to be fixed where necessary. We will work together to ensure that we deliver them.”

He said when the Port Harcourt-Aba train operation begins, the corporation will explore means of extending it to Umuahia and Enugu.

Very soon we will start enjoying train rides from Port Harcourt to Aba while even looking at extending to Umuahia and Enugu.

“We are looking at days at most months because if you don’t start running on this track, you leave it, it will go bad and vandals may take possession.

”So we are now going to meet, and work out a possible plan because we have to synchronise with operations to make sure that when they put it, it is not going to be vandalised,” the NRC MD explained.

While warning against vandalising the project, Okhoria said people would benefit from it and advised those encroaching into the rail line to stay away as work was still ongoing.

On some security measures being taken against vandals, he stated, “Right now, what we are doing is encouraging the relevant security agencies. And it comes at a cost because if a policeman is to do four hours or eight hours, you have stretched him, so we have to pay him for that stretch.

“And we also believe that by the time we run regularly and the track is not idle, I think our people will have pity on us and know that we are available so that they can benefit from the operation.

“That is the way to go. We should continue to educate our people that what they are vandalising is their own. It is not the President, the Governor, the Minister, or the MD’s own. It is our own.”

The Abuja-Kaduna train had derailed at the Kubwa station which led to the suspension of operations on the rail line.

The announcement was made in a statement by the Director, Operations, NRC, Niyi Alli, on Monday.

The statement read, “Subsequently, the service will resume on Tuesday, January 31, 2023, with the following daily schedule; KA2 departs Rigasa at 7am; AK1 departs Idu at 10am; KA4 departs Rigasa at 1pm while AK3 departs Idu at 4pm.

“However on Wednesday only KA2 will depart Rigasa at 7am and AK 3 will depart Idu at 4pm.

“The Corporation once again regrets any inconvenience our esteemed passengers may have experienced as a result of the temporary suspension of the service.”

The Manager, Abuja-Kaduna Train Service, Mr Pascal Nnorli, told the News Agency of Nigeria on Friday that the adjustments were to ensure early arrival of the trains to their destinations.

According to Nnorli, the trains will now depart 30 minutes earlier than their previous take-off time.

He said, “The AK3 from Idu (Abuja) which takes off at 3:30 pm to arrive Rigasa (Kaduna) at 5:38 pm, will now leave at 3:00 p.m., to arrive at 5:08 pm.

Also KA4 train of 2:00 p.m. from Rigasa(Kaduna) will now depart from Rigasa at 1:30 p.m. and arrive at Idu(Abuja) at 3:37 p.m. instead of 4:07 p.m.”

According to the manager, the amendment will take effect from Dec. 12.

Nnorli, however, reiterated the commitment of the corporation to ensure the safety of its passengers and properties onboard its trains at all times.

The NRC resumed services along the Abuja-Kaduna rail corridor on December 5 after over eight months of non-operation.

Managing Director of the NRC, Mr Fidet Okhiria made the announcement on Thursday April 14, saying it would enhance the safety and security of rail users.

Okhiria also said the Abuja-Kaduna Train Service will resume as soon as possible with additional security measures put in place.

He said; “The process of linking passengers to their NIN for improved profiling is ongoing. This layer of passenger screening will commence by May.The Abuja-Kaduna Train Service will resume as soon as possible with additional security measures put in place.While we continue to sympathise with families of those who lost or have not seen their loved ones, we encourage anyone still looking for a loved one to please call us.The numbers to call are 08033546208, 08060044600 and 07066700150.The corporation will continue to update the general public of the latest developments.This means that all the 14 de-railed rolling stock (11 coaches, two rescue coaches and one locomotive engine on the rescue train) have all been re-railed – from the incident site to our stations at Idu, Abuja and Rigasa, Kaduna.Intensive track repair work continues at the site. An advanced level of track repairs has been achieved and hopefully, it will be rounded off in 10 days.The NRC expresses its profound gratitude to security agencies for the continued support, especially for the security cover availed our officials and staff at the incident site.”

This is coming after terrorists attacked an Abuja-Kaduna bound train. 8 passengers were killed while many others were abducted.

N50 was paid as a premium to two indigenous insurance companies on every train ticket purchased by passengers who boarded the Abuja-Kaduna train.

It was also learnt that the terrorists have refused to speak with relatives of those abducted with respect to negotiating the release of the kidnapped travellers, and have instead opted to negotiate with government who they said is aware of their demands.

When the publication asked if the bombed train was insured, officials at the Federal Ministry of Transportation and the Nigerian Railway Corporation allegedly replied in the affirmative.

They, however, stressed that the insurance of the train was not against terror attacks, though efforts were ongoing to see how the insurance companies would support the government.

An official at the transportation ministry, who pleaded not to be named due to lack of authorisation to speak on the matter said;

“Why we have not gone public about this yet is because they (insurance companies) said that any terrorist act is not covered by insurance. But on the train tickets, for every passenger, N50 is paid as premium for insurance. The train itself is insured but that does not cover acts of terrorism or banditry.However, we are still trying to convince them (insurance firms) to see reasons why something could be done. But the argument has been that acts of banditry and acts of God are not insured.”

An official at the NRC also said that two indigenous companies were in charge of the insurance of passengers, while there were different other firms handling the insurance for the coaches, rolling stock and others.

He added; “Yes, we have about two Nigerian insurance companies that are in charge of passengers’ insurance, while the train itself is being handled by other firms”

One Idayat Yusuf, whose two sisters were abducted by terrorists during the attack on the train, told the publication that the families of those kidnapped had lost hope in the government.

She said the kidnappers had insisted that they would not speak with the family members of those abducted, and no condolence message had been sent to the families of those who lost their loved ones in the train attack, nor to families of passengers who were abducted during the incident.

Idayat said; “The threat to kill those abducted, including my sisters, has increased fear among family members of the kidnapped train passengers. This is because life means nothing to terrorists. We are in fear and we have lost hope in the government because you don’t know how true is whatever they are telling the public on this matter. They will tell you this and you will find out that they are not actually doing what they told you.Before we staged the protest at Radio House in Abuja last week, we had earlier heard that they (government) were negotiating. But when we got to Radio House we now realised that honestly, they don’t have anything they want to do. They don’t have any plan to release those who were abducted.This shows how insensitive the government is about this issue and until we see our family members back home we don’t believe what they are saying about negotiating for the release of the passengers.It is just unfortunate on our own part that the kidnappers said they are not talking to us. Otherwise, we will strive to settle them to bring our family members back home to us. But it is beyond us.They don’t want to talk to us, they say they don’t have any business with us, that the government knows what they want.They said if the government didn’t talk to them, they would turn their camp into a slaughterhouse.If not that they want the government to talk to them, we would have released our family members secretly without the government even knowing how we did it.”

NRC’s Managing Director, Fidet Okhiria, disclosed this in a statement made available to newsmen on Monday.

He said that the corporation was working assiduously with security agencies to ensure that the abductees were rescued and reunited with their families.

”We are committed to the rescue of our passengers and staff who were aboard the ill-fated Ak9 train service,” Okhiria said, adding that all hands would be on deck to effectually ”collaborate with security agencies to ensure that all persons being held are rescued unhurt and reunited with their families”.

Our heart goes out to those who lost loved ones, and those injured in the attack who are now recuperating,” he said.

The managing director stated that 191 out of the 362 validated passengers aboard the train had been confirmed safe and were in their various homes.

He also stated that ”five others were confirmed safe on April 4” while ”about 46 phone numbers on the manifest are still either switched off or not reachable”.

He, however, noted that ”33 phone numbers are ringing but not answered while 62 phone numbers are responding to be non-existent”.

Okhiria said that so far 22 persons had been reported missing by their relatives, with eight persons already confirmed dead.

Speaking on the 20 crew members aboard the train, the NRC boss noted that, of the seven NRC staff aboard, ”five are safe and two missing; 10 janitors: six are safe, three missing and one dead. Also, one caterer is safe while two are missing”.

The managing director said that an additional coach, SP 00020, had been re-railed and moved safely to Rigasa Station, bringing the total number of recovered coaches that had been safely moved to the NRC stations to eight.

“Intensive track repair works have been ongoing to enable the recovery of the remaining coaches and locomotives,” he said, promising to keep the general public abreast of the unfolding developments to avoid speculations and misinformation