Northern Elders Laud 2025 Timeline For Gas Pipeline Project

Northern elders under the aegis of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) have expressed delight over the renewed commitment of the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu-led federal government to complete the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) Gas Pipeline early in 2025.

The forum said the heart-warming news which came during the visit of a high-powered delegation of the federal government to the project site in Kaduna last Friday led by the minister of finance and coordinating minister of the economy, Mr. Wale Edun, minister of information and national orientation, Alhaji Mohammed Malagi, minister of state for petroleum (Gas), Mr. Ekperikpe Ekpo, and Group Chief Executive Officer (GCEO) of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Mallam Mele Kyari, was quite reassuring.

ACF, in a statement issued by its national publicity secretary, Prof. T. A. Muhammad-Baba, says it wholly agrees with Edun’s observation that the AKK Gas pipeline will be critical to Nigeria’s industrialisation endeavours and a much-welcome relief for the economy in general.

“It will indeed be recalled that during the ACF leadership’s visit to President Tinubu on May 30, 2024, a plea for the completion of the AKK Gas Pipeline was on the wish list of the forum for the attention of the president and commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces. Other projects listed included the Mambila Hydroelectric Dam, Sokoto-Badagri Highway, dredging of Rivers Benue and Niger, the Great Green Wall and ongoing railway and highway projects,” ACF said.

While the forum commended Tinubu for the AKK Project, it reiterated its plea for attention to other projects that, if and when implemented, will greatly improve the economies of the northern states and Nigeria at large.

“Finally, convinced about the economic transformational benefits of the gas pipeline project, ACF calls for its extension to other states. In particular, extending the line from Zaria towards Katsina and Zamfara States should not cost too much. Such an endeavour has the real potential to positively impact on the revival of moribund industries in Funtua, Katsina and Gusau, as well as the establishment of new ones,” the statement reads.