The Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, has said the government needs helicopters, drones, and other technologies to protect the rail tracks in Nigeria.
Amaechi stated this while inspecting the site of the bombing of the rail line between the Katari and Rijani train station along the Kaduna-Abuja route.
According to the minister: “We are thinking about the possibility of employing natives until we get those equipment. We also need helicopters; beyond the drones, we need helicopters.
“The equipment are just N3 billion.
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“For me, I am devastated and honestly I don’t know what to tell Nigerians anymore.
“The cameras in the train cannot pick what is happening outside. What you need is a camera that shows 100 metres away from the train, if there are unknown things carrying guns. Then, we can take precautions but we have done all we need to do in the ministry of transport, we have forwarded them for approval but we have not gotten approval.
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“The patrol vehicles are available but they cannot reach everywhere. For the areas the vehicles can patrol, they forestall any incident.
“What we need is technology that let you know that there are human activities or foreign activities on the track, that way, you can secure the locomotive and secure lives and I had warned earlier that it is important they get us this approval because human lives would be involved. Since that warning till today, we have had two incidents.”
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