By Frank Momoh
For what he calls “genuine efforts to improve our infrastructural development,” President Muhammadu Buhari has expressed appreciation to the People’s Republic of China.
The President spoke Friday at State House, Abuja, while receiving in audience the Chairman of China Railway Construction Corporation Limited (CRCC), Mr Fenjian Chen.
Nigeria’s infrastructure, the President said, had depreciated and deteriorated over the years, affecting standard of living, and leading to loss of lives through avoidable accidents.
“We are very grateful to China for the effort to rebuild our infrastructure, and for bringing technical expertise to the country. We will give the required support and cooperation, so that our old, out of date, and collapsed infrastructure might be turned around,” President Buhari said.
He promised to personally pay attention to the many projects being undertaken in the country, for the good of Nigerian people.
Mr Chen, who led a high-powered Chinese team to meet with the President, said CRCC is an international company, operating currently in 124 countries of the world. It has 18,000 local employees in Nigeria alone.
Part of projects CRCC is undertaking include rail way, dry port, free trade zone, and building of highways. About 40,000 more jobs are to be created from these.
“The sum of $250 million dollars will be invested on a dry port in Ibadan, Oyo State, and it will decongest the ports in Lagos, and speed up clearance of goods by the Customs Service,” Mr Chen said.
He commended President Buhari for the war against corruption and insecurity, expressing confidence that Nigeria will soon become a much better country.