In spite of the much touted successes of the
Federal Government in reviving the hitherto ailing
Nigeria Railway Corporation, the majority of the
passenger coaches are old, giving travellers little or
no comfort.
Investigations by our correspondent revealed that
some of the coaches in use are actually decades
old. In fact, the first-class coach which this
journalist boarded from Lagos to Ilorin, Kwara State,
on February 7, was the one previously used to ply
the Omi-Adio to Bodija intra-city mass transit in
Ibadan, Oyo State, in the early ’90s.
NRC Assistant Director, Public Relations, Mr. David
Ndakotsu, corroborates our correspondent’s
findings as he notes that some of the coaches are
indeed as old as 20 years.
Shameful facilities
“Yes, we have coaches that are about 20 years old.
But we don’t have any coach that is older than
that,” Ndakotsu tells our correspondent.
As expected, the majority of the factory-fitted
facilities on many of the coaches have broken
down, leaving the corporation with no options other
than to improvise.
For instance, the air conditioner, which is the only
luxury available to passengers on the first-class
coach this journalist travelled in, could not be
enjoyed. It has packed up; while the two make-shift
split ACs hung on the walls of the coach adjacent to
each other only blew raw air without any cooling
effect.
“The Nigeria Railway Corporation could do better
than this, though. It is already over one year since
it began the inter-city rail transport operations but
things don’t seem to have progressed,” Sunday
Oyeniran, a passenger on the first class coach,
laments.
Oyeniran, who was travelling from the Iddo
Terminus in Lagos to Inisha, Osun State, regrets
paying an extra 60 per cent over the regular N560
fare for the economy class.
“I haven’t enjoyed the extra N340 I paid for this
first-class ride. The coach is as good as not having
an air conditioner,” he laments as he wipes off the
sweat on his face.
A visit to the seven other coaches on the train,
which was economy class, also reveals the
harrowing experience of the second-rated
travellers.
The population of passengers on each of the
economy class coaches far outweighs those on the
first-class facility. While the single class coach
seats only 60 passengers, each of the seven
economy coaches has 90 seats.
But the economy facilities are usually crowded, as
they are the coaches where railway officials cramp
travellers whenever they carry passengers more
than the train’s sitting capacity.
Apart from the overcrowding the majority of the
overhead fans were not functional.
Harvest of dust
On one of the economy coaches, only two of the
fans were working, forcing travellers to throw open
the windows of the coaches to forestall suffocation.
But the travellers’ self-help discretion also comes
with its disadvantages. As the Ilorin-bound train
covered distances, specks of dust from the
countryside soon took over the coaches, with many
passengers forced to cover their noses in a bid to
stave off the dust.
Frequent travellers came prepared for the
challenge, as a handful of them were seen putting
on face masks. However, the first timers were at
the mercy of the dust.
“I wear face mask not only for preventing dust but
to also contain the offensive odour emanating from
toilets,” a middle-aged man who declines to give his
name says.
The state of many of the toilets and bathrooms on
the coaches are nauseating, to say the least. Apart
from their dirty state, some of them have their
doors damaged, depriving users any form of
privacy.
Even the booking terminal at the Offa Station was in
a derelict state, as it lacks basic aesthetics. The
majority of the stations also have no loudspeakers
to communicate with passengers, while some of the
stations are usually thrown into darkness at night
as they have long been disconnected from the
national grid.
Suffering and smiling
Mrs. Esther Ademola joins the train at the Abeokuta
Station en route Osogbo, the Osun State capital —
one of the stopovers on the Lagos-Ilorin route.
The woman in her 50s and her aged husband were
returning home after a visit to one of their children
in Abeokuta.
The coaches were filled to the brim, as the train,
which took off at the Iddo Terminus, Lagos, had
picked up extra passengers at the Agege and Ijoko
stations before getting to Abeokuta.
Ademola was boxed in the far right corner of the
small compartment in-between the first class and
the seventh economy class coach. She sat on her
luggage.
“We were lucky that my aged husband was able to
get a seat. A Good Samaritan gave up his seat for
him. At least, I was also able to get this space to
rest my legs,” Ademola says.
One of her regrets, though, is the intensive itching
she experiences on her skin as a result of the
overcrowding.
She says, “As you can see, the windows are
always open because of heat, while the glass
covering of the entrance is damaged. This makes
dust and other elements such as dry leaves to find
their way into the coaches.
“Sometimes, the wind blows the devil’s bean plant
into the coach. When this happens, passengers
virtually run berserk, as they are forced to scratch
their bodies due to the burning effects of the devil
bean plant!”
She says she has continued to travel by rail simply
because it is cheaper than other means of
transportation.
“We paid N350 each for our trip from Abeokuta to
Osogbo. If it were to be by road, we would have to
pay nothing less than N1,200 per head.”
Students embrace trains
One of the major categories of people who patronise
train services running on the Lagos-Kano rail route
are students of tertiary institutions.
The majority of them are students of the University
of Ilorin, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria; Kwara
State University, Malete; Ibrahim Badamosi
Babangida University, Lapai, Niger State; Federal
Polytechnic Offa, Kwara State, and Federal
Polytechnic, Ede, among others.
Some of the students, in separate chats with our
correspondent say the cheap fares, relative
absence of accidents and virtually nil cases of
armed robbery on the railways have been the
overriding factors sustaining their patronage.
A Higher National Diploma student of the Federal
Polytechnic, Offa, Lukman Alabi, joins the Lagos-
Ilorin train from Ijoko to Offa each time he is
returning to school.
Alabi, who paid N400 for the trip on the economy
class coach, took to standing for most part of the
journey. At a point, it was difficult for this
correspondent to have a chat with him as there
were so many people on board so much so that
there was hardly any space to move one’s leg.
“Aside the cheap fares, there’s nothing good about
this train ride. The inconvenience is just too much,”
Alabi laments.
Snail-like crawling trains
Before now, the Federal Government had boasted
that the “express passenger trains” which ply the
1,126km Lagos-Kano line carried a whopping five
million passengers in 2013 alone. However, findings
by our correspondent show that the trains actually
travel at an average speed of 40km/hour.
Sources at the NRC, who confided in our
correspondent, say the snail speed is as a result of
the continuous dependence on the old technology
which the colonial masters bequeathed to us for the
running of the “revived” railway system.
Ndakotsu, the NRC spokesman, agrees with our
correspondent that the speed at which the trains
travel leaves much to be desired. He, however,
says some of the express passenger trains could
still manage to travel at a high speed of as much as
50km/hour.
This is in sharp contrast with what obtains in some
African countries where trains move at a speed of
as much as 160km/hour. For instance, the Gautrain
which links Johannesburg, Pretoria and Ekhuruleni
and the Tambo International Airport in South Africa
travels at a speed of 160 km/hour.
Besides, the comfort with which South African rail
commuters travel puts to question the success of
the much-talked about transformation of the
Nigerian railway system.
While the business express passengers on the
Metrorail trains in South Africa enjoy onboard
services such as refreshments, complimentary
newspapers, and are treated to movies from two
giant LCD screens per coach, such cannot be said
of Nigerian travellers on first-class coaches who
battle with suffocation as a result of badly
functioning air conditioners and overhead fans.
An Associate Professor of Economics, University of
Lagos, Dr. Olufemi Saibu, in a chat with our
correspondent, wonders if any member of the
Federal Executive Council would be willing to travel
by rail, considering the unflattering state of facilities
and services.
Saibu, whose research interests are in the area of
urban transport, public finance and economic
development, says it is imperative for the
government to increase expenditure towards the
total overhaul of the railway system.
He notes that an efficient and effective railway
system will help in opening up communities,
reducing cost of doing business, increasing the
profit margin of entrepreneurs, thereby creating new
jobs, expanding existing businesses and helping in
better urban management.
He says the government can liberalise the railways
with a view to bringing about efficiency in the
system.
“We have to change our current use of the old
locomotives and coaches by switching over to new
technology. We cannot continue to use the old
technology that has been rejected by those who
invented them.
“Government needs to increase its expenditure on
railway infrastructure and encourage the private
sector to come into the business,” he adds.
No basis for comparison — NRC
The management of the NRC has said that there is
no basis for comparing operations of the Nigerian
railway system with what obtains in other
countries.
“There is no way you can compare the speed of the
train in Nigeria with those in Europe or Japan where
they use electronic trains. There is no basis for
comparison. Over there, they use electronic trains
that travel at 500 km/hour.
“We can get there, depending on when we have
stable power and when we have standard gauges.
We are operating at the current level of technology
that we have,” Ndakotsu says.
The NRC argues that infrastructure on ground may
not allow Nigerians to enjoy the full capabilities of
the new locomotives that were recently acquired by
the Corporation.
“Most of the trains we have can move at the same
speed of between 100 and 120 km per hour, but we
don’t travel at that speed. For passenger trains, we
go like 50 or 60km/hour.
“It is like that because our tracks are narrow. We
use what we call narrow gauges instead of the
standard gauges. Besides, we have very steep
gradients with very sharp corners on our tracks. We
cannot afford to have accidents, as train services
are primed on safety. In this situation, we can’t
move past that speed,” Ndakotsu says.
He, however, adds that the government has started
the conversion from narrow to standard gauges
piecemeal. According to him, the rail line being
constructed from Kaduna to Abuja, as well as the
one connecting Ajaokuta, Kogi State, with Warri,
Delta State, is in the mould of a standard gauge.
“When they finish with those ones, they will start
standard gauges all over the country; that will work
side by side with the narrow gauges. It is a gradual
process,” he notes.
Poorly motivated workers
Experts have said that the operation of railways
anywhere in the world is complex and requires a
wide range of technical skills from a well motivated
pool of staff. However, members of staff of the NRC
are crying foul over their conditions of service.
Many of them complain that they are the least-paid
categories of federal civil servants in the transport
sector.
A Level 5 official of the NRC, who speaks on the
condition of anonymity because he is not authorised
to speak to the press, says that his gross monthly
salary currently stands at N23,000.
The NRC employee who has put in three years of
service, having been posted to the Lagos District of
the corporation, says his duty tour allowance of
N600 per 100km travelled is being owed.
“Our salaries cannot take us anywhere. Besides,
those of us that travel with the trains are entitled to
Mileage Allowance as well as Duty Tour Allowances.
But we are being owed a backlog of these
allowances running into several months. How do
they want us to survive and take care of our
families?” he laments.
A Level 8 official with over 17 years of service in
the corporation, who says he receives a little over
N44,000 monthly, was also sighted sleeping on one
of the parked trains on the premises of the Ilorin
station when our correspondent visited.
When asked why he decided to retire into the coach,
the middle-aged man who hails from the northern
part of the country says he passes the night on the
parked wagons because there is no provisions for
accommodating NRC employees on duty tour in any
of the stations they travel to.
“I am not the only one passing the night on this
train. Check other coaches, you will find other
people lying there too. That is the situation we have
found ourselves, as nobody appears to care for our
wellbeing,” the official, who is a member of the
Central Riding Squad, says.
Strings of corrupt practices
To this end, a handful of members of staff of the
corporation have resorted to sharp practices in a
bid to augment their alleged meagre income.
At the Offa Station where this correspondent
boarded a first-class coach to Zaria, it was
observed that while the tickets for the economy
class coaches were on sale at the counter, the
boarding pass for the luxury coach were hoarded.
Despite getting to the train station 11 hours before
the 10p.m. departure time, tickets were not
available, as they were said to be in the sole
custody of the station head who was nowhere to be
found.
Barely an hour to departure, one of the ticketing
officers decided to sell but at a hiked price. The Offa
to Zaria ticket was sold to our correspondent for
N2,500 instead of the N1,640 official rate; while
those travelling to Kano paid N3,000 instead of the
official N1,980.
“That is how we were asked to sell it and people
have been buying it like that,” the ticketing officer
yells at our correspondent who complains about the
inflated price.
The head of the station was not available in his
office when this correspondent made repeated
visits to complain about the rip-off. Frequent train
passengers said they were familiar with the game.
It turned out that passengers travelling on the
economy class coaches who do not want to sit near
the toilets because of the offensive odour confess to
tipping off the officials with sums ranging between
N300 and N500 to get a seat reservation far away
from the rest rooms.
‘We don’t owe salaries, allowances’
Reacting to employees’ allegation of poor welfare
condition, Ndakotsu says the corporation is trying to
“meet up” to ensure that workers are “comfortable
and happy.”
He says the railway employees remain the “prime
factor of production” of train operations in the
country, adding that the NRC places high premium
on human capacity and welfare packages for
members of staff.
He also notes that allegations that allowances and
other entitlements are being owed are untrue. He
says those complaining might be the staff members
who are claiming “frivolous allowances.”
“It is not true. Those allegations are false. If you
are entitled to certain allowances, you are given. In
fact, all allowances are paid as due. We go by civil
service rules. When you are entitled to an
allowance, you will be given,” he adds.
CREDITS: PUNCH NEWSPAPERS
