Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) through the Transport Secretariat has vowed to prosecute five suspected vandals, who were arrested in the early hours of Wednesday while engaging in the act of vandalising the facilities of the rail track of the Abuja Light Rail project.
The suspected criminals who specialised in vandalising perimeter fences, communication cables, and rail track cables were arrested by the vigilant security personnel assigned to guard the railway facilities.
The mandate secretary of the Transportation Secretariat, Uboku Nyah who visited the various sections of the vandalized rail track at Kukwuaba, said such an act of sabotage from the citizenry was highly condemnable.
Nyah wondered why residents, for whom the government expended so much funds to provide the social infrastructure that would ameliorate their living conditions, would be involved in the act of sabotaging the effort by vandalising them.
He vowed that he would ensure that appropriate authorities institute legal actions against the suspects to serve as a deterrent to others.
“Over the past few days, the FCT minister has been emphasising the importance of efficient transportation, particularly rail transportation, in line with the vision of the renewed hope agenda of the President, in providing cheap and safe transportation for our people.
“The anchor of that is rail transportation, which can move the people massively from one place to another, and the government has invested heavily in that infrastructure.
“We are sad to come and see what has happened. We got this report in the office that there has been a lot of vandalism on our protective fences, tracks, and communication cables.
“We came to see what has been happening, and we can confirm what we have seen. It is sad and very condemnable that the people that we are working for are doing this because people didn’t come from outer space to cause this level of vandalism.
“What this means is that we have to spend double, and delay the project. We had expected that within the year the rail services would start. But, when we came here and saw that even the cables and the protective fences have been vandalised by our people, it is something that takes us back, and it is criminal for anybody to do this,” he said.
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