The Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the United States Consulate and a United States-based firm, Atlanta Global Resources Inc., AGRI, to build a railway network that will connect the nine states of the Niger Delta region.
According to a statement by the Director, Corporate Affairs, Ibitoye Abosede, on Tuesday, said they will provide locomotives, construct railway lines and operate same in the oil producing states of Rivers, Ondo, Edo, Delta, Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Imo and Abia.
It stated that the MOU was signed by the managing director/CEO of the NDDC, Dr. Samuel Ogbuku, on behalf of the Commission, Mr. Chamberlain Eke, on behalf of the United States Consulate, and Mr. Tony Akpele, on behalf of AGRI.
It added that work on the preliminary stages of the project, perhaps the biggest in the history of the Commission, is expected to start immediately.
”Speaking at the ceremony. Ogbuku disclosed that the NDDC was determined to renavigate the process of its intervention in the Niger Delta so that it can achieve its mandate “of facilitating the rapid, even and sustainable development of the Niger Delta into a region that is economically prosperous, socially stable, ecologically regenerative and politically peaceful.
”He stated that the MOU represented a big harvest for the NDDC from the PPP Summit”, the statement reads.