The Abuja-Kaduna rail service ran over N20m deficit monthly in 2018, the Managing Director, Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), Engr. Fidet Okhiria has said.
Engr. Ohkria, who spoke in Abuja, said the service generated about N80 million in revenue monthly in 2018, higher than the about N16m monthly average in 2017.
Okhiria however, said that in spite of the increase in revenue, the corporation was yet to break even as it still spends over N100 million monthly as running cost.
Based on the N80m monthly revenue, the NRC generated about N960 million on the service in 2018 but based on the N100m monthly running cost, the NRC however spent about N1.2bn on the service, representing a deficit of about N240 million in 2018.
The NRC boss attributed the high expenses to the purchase of diesel for generators at the train stations.
“We are close to breaking even on the Abuja-Kaduna train, we have made progress because of the efforts we made,” he said.
“When we started, we were earning about N16 million and spending about N56 million, but right now, we can comfortably say we earn over N80 million although we still spend over N100 million, which is closer to breaking even,” he said.
According to him, by the time the NRC has more coaches and run more trains, the expenses will reduce and more patronage will come in.
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