Managing Director of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), Mr Fidet Okhiria, said the corporation lost over 150,000 rail clips due to constant vandalism along railway tracks between 2022 and 2023.
Okhiria disclosed this during the end-of-the-year media briefing in Lagos yesterday.
He said that over 50,000 clips each had been vandalized between Lagos – Ibadan, Warri- Itakpe, and Abuja-Kaduna standard gauge tracks between 2022 and 2023.
Okhiria said that the corporation had engaged in constant sensitization to communities where the vandalism took place to make them realize the implication of the act to the growth of rail networking in the country.
“The only issue we have now is vandalism of the tracks, which is a big problem. When we replace the tracks, they will come back and vandalise the track again.
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“Just before Christmas, the hoodlums vandalised over 200 clips between Mushin -Oshodi area and we had to replace them within three days after the vandalism.
“We are looking for a way to protect the clips, we will also continue to discuss it at the management meeting where we will have to engage a special person to guide our position,” Okhiria said.
He said that despite the constant arrests for the vandalism, the corporation still recorded clips being vandalised from time to time.
The Managing Director said that the only solution to stop the vandalism of the train track clips was to try and occupy the trains daily.
