FG requests German financing advisory to fund $1.9 billion Kano-Maradi railway

The Nigerian Government met with the German Financing Advisory Unit in a bid to speed up funding required for the $1.9 billion Kano–Maradi railway.

This disclosure was made by the office of the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, after he met with the financing advisory unit at the Nigerian Embassy, Berlin, according to NAN.

The Minister’s office in a statement stated that the meeting was held with representatives of KfW-IPEX bank of Germany, who are serving as advisory in partnership with the African Finance Corporation for the Kano-Maradi rail project to secure funding for the project.

Amaechi said the Export Credit Agencies (ECAs) could come to Nigeria and become part of the process to ensure everything followed their recommenced practices and avert hiccups in the course of the project.

On resettlement of villagers, the Minister told the German investors that Nigeria had laws in place for that, adding that “For us in the Ministry of Transportation, in choosing the right of way, we avoided communities. If we don’t do that, we’ll clear the entire Kano.

Like in Lagos, we avoided communities and used the old line, because if we had to choose a different route we would pay billions. In fact, to even work from the old line, we paid N7 billion in compensations.

”This was not because the people had the right to the land, but because if after 12 years and nothing is done it becomes their land and you just can’t chase them out.

”We still paid compensation, because the rail line was moribund. To eject them we still had to treat them as though they were the original owners of the land. We didn’t wait for Europe. That’s our law.