Train services along the Lagos-Ibadan corridor has been cut by the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) following the ever increasing rise in the price of diesel.
NRC Managing Director, Fidet Okhiria said in a Punch interview: “The Lagos-Ibadan train service is running, but we have reduced the number of trips on that route because of the diesel problem. We reduced the number of trips we are running because of the hike in diesel price.
“We are now doing two return trips as against six, which by now should have gone to 10. So we run just two trips now due to the diesel problem.”
The NRC boss added that there would be no price increase as it was outside the corporation’s mandate to fix prices. However, he noted that a recommendation has been sent to the Federal Ministry of Transportation for price review.
“We have made some recommendations. But even with the recommendations we made, the new price of diesel has overshot our workings as contained in the recommendations,” Okhiria said.
“However, we don’t want to price ourselves out of the market too, because the price of petrol is not increasing as such, rather the increase is little when compared to diesel price. And you know we are competing with transporters on roads.”
At the check the price of diesel has hit N800 per litre, indicating a 28 percent increase . It went for 625/litre in March.
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