Nigeria has given the green light for construction of the 1,200 km “coastal” SGR rail line which would connect all six of its southern port cities, from Lagos in the west, to Calabar in the east. At a meeting of their Federal Executive Committee on Aug. 6, members voted to allocate $1.2 billion for the project, giving it a six-year deadline for completion, in 2027.
In announcing the project — one which has generated many “false positive” rumors over the years — Information and Culture Minister Lai Mohammed said, “This is a very old project, which we [the Buhari administration] inherited. Under the former administration, an approval was given, but nothing was done, but today, the council has given approval to commence the Lagos-Calabar coastal route.”
The Coastal line would connect six major ports of the nation, and provide the east-west anchor for north-south SGR lines (some segments which are already built/under construction) which would form a “square” grid of lines connecting all four “corners” of the nation. The Lagos-Calabar line would have 12 stops and several spurs to regional population centers. In addition to rail, Nigerian visionaries have previously discussed creating whole new port cities, as well as enlarging and deepening existing ports.
The difficulty all these years has, of course, been financing. While China has both financed and built several segments of standard gauge rail (SGR) in Nigeria, they have recently pulled back their financing of large projects, although they are still building lines there. Three years ago, the American firm Ameri Metro announced with great bravado that it had $10 billion to invest in Nigeria rail, only to disappear just as quickly as several others. With today’s announcement, Nigeria has realized it must shoulder the load — despite heavy pandemic losses — knowing its citizens will benefit.
While it is not announced who would build the project, the news of the green-lighting, which is circulating widely in Nigerian press, has been found in only one other national press — that of China, where Xinhua wrote an article on Aug. 6, which was reposted by CGTN.
