Insecurity: NRC To Restrict Passengers Without NIN From May

Nigerian Railway Corporation has said that passengers without the National Identity Number will be denied access to travel by rail from May 2022.

Speaking in Abuja on Thursday, he Managing Director of the commission, Fidet Okhiria said it is part of plans to secure lives and properties of train users in the country.

Reports have it that it is a reaction to the recent bandits attack on the ill-fated Kaduna-Abuja train where several lives perished and many others missing.

Activities of train in Kaduna was suspended after the attack.

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He said, “The process of linking passengers to their NIN for improved profiling is ongoing. This layer of passenger screening will commence by May.

“The Abuja-Kaduna Train Service will resume as soon as possible with additional security measures put in place.

“While we continue to sympathise with families of those who lost or have not seen their loved ones, we encourage anyone still looking for a loved one to please call us.

“The corporation will continue to update the general public of the latest developments.”

Okhiria added that as part of security measures in forestalling future occurrences, the NRC had re-railed the last rolling stock affected in the attack.

“This means that all the 14 de-railed rolling stock (11 coaches, two rescue coaches and one locomotive engine on the rescue train) have all been re-railed – from the incident site to our stations at Idu, Abuja and Rigasa, Kaduna.

“Intensive track repair work continues at the site. An advanced level of track repairs has been achieved and hopefully, it will be rounded off in 10 days,’’ he explained.

“The NRC expresses its profound gratitude to security agencies for the continued support, especially for the security cover availed our officials and staff at the incident site,’’ Okhiria stated.