Abandoning wagon assembly plant could derail rail projects  

The country’s quest to accelerate it rail development projects is being jeopardise with the current state of the Wagon Assembly Plant in Kajola, Ogun state, that has since been abandoned,  a former Minister of Transportation, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi warned on Thursday. 

The plant, commissioned by former President Muhammadu Buhari in 2023 the first in West Africa, and has a locomotive and rolling depot capacity to produce 500 wagons per year of open wagons, container flat wagons and box wagons.

But Amaechi, who was the Keynote Speaker at the maiden edition of the Nigeria Transport Summit organised by the Transportation Correspondents Association of Nigeria (TCAN) in Lagos revealed that the plant is currently abandoned. 

The former Rivers State Governor said “There are so many things we had in the rail project that most other countries didn’t get.

“If you get to Prof. Yemi Osinbajo Train Station in Kajola, there is a Wagon Rolling Stock there. We commissioned that facility in 2023. 

The Kajola Locomotive and Wagon Rolling Stock was not part of the Lagos-Ibadan Rail project, but we insisted that the Chinese must build the facilitiy to enable us gain knowledge transfer in the area of Wagon and Rolling Stock manufacturing. 

“I told the Chinese that I am going to give them a contract to supply Nigeria 200 Rolling Stock.  I however told them that I won’t approve the contract if they don’t build a Wagon Assembly Plant in Nigeria. That after five years, they will start Assembling and manufacturing Wagons and Rolling Stocks in Nigeria.  The agreement was signed.

“The reason for doing this was to create employment and reduce foreign exchange expenditure because we will produce here. Don’t forget, this was not part of the railway contract. I told the Chinese that instead of giving me money, they should go and build Transportation University, and they did.

“The Kajola Locomotive and Wagon Assembly Plant was also one of the demands I made from the Chinese, and it was also built.

“I was in South Africa, and saw that they are producing Locomotives. I asked them how they did it, and they said they awarded Locomotive contract to the Chinese and asked them to build a plant for them so they will know how they did it.

“So, because I wanted Nigeria to also benefit the same way South Africa benefitted, I demanded that the Chinese build a Wagon and Rolling Stock Depot in Nigeria.

“This was done and was commissioned in 2023, but as I speak today, that facility has been abandoned. Nothing is happening there. Until we continue to invest in transportation, we might never get it right in this country.”