Transport minister Rotimi Amaechi has ordered the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) to hand over tickets and passengers’ identification to Secure ID, the company in charge of the e-ticketing platform for the Abuja-Kaduna rail service.

According to Mr Amaechi, this will help reduce incidents of crime and curb security challenges on the route.

Mr Amaechi stated this when the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission(ICRC) visited and presented the Full Business Case Certificates (FBC) for the Lagos-Ibadan and Itakpe-Warri e-ticketing service to him in Abuja.

He explained that introducing the e-ticketing platform for Abuja-Kaduna blocked all revenue leakages and increase revenue on the route from about N100 million to N400 million monthly.

“The benefits of the e-ticketing is that we rose from N100 million to N400 million per month, which is an improvement. We have been able to do something that will eliminate leakages,” stressed the transport minister. “The one I think I may disagree with the public is the issue of ticket racketeering. I have spoken with the person in charge of the Abuja-Kaduna e-ticket platform to take over the identification process from NRC.”

The National Assembly had complained that NRC was not cross-checking the identification of passengers on the tickets, noted the minister.

“They wanted to do it, but they have not gotten the approval from NRC. So, I have told NRC to allow them to do it. So that we match faces with the names, it’s not all about crime alone but is also security, so we release it to those security outlets,” Mr Amaechi pointed out. 

He added, “Even though we cannot eliminate 100 per cent crime and corruption, it will reduce the danger of having to run into security crises. So, we know that what we are battling is not crises in our terminals, but on the way.”

While presenting the FBC, Michael Ohiani, the ICRC’s acting director-general, said the concession was for 10 years. According to Mr Ohiani, it will generate over N140 billion for the country during the period and also help create over 3000 direct and indirect jobs for Nigerians.

(NAN)