The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) says the Federal Government is poised in its commitment to bridging the infrastructure gap in Nigeria.

The Acting Director-General of the commission, Mr Michael Ohiani said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Sunday.

The ICRC boss hinted that plans were at advanced stage to begin the process of procuring a concessionaire for the Lagos/Ibadan rail and the Itakpe/Warri rail.

Ohiani said that the concessionaire would be responsible for managing security as well as ticketing with regards to the service.

He said that the infrastructure gap was too big for the government alone to handle as it required more than three billion dollars over 30 years, hence the need to have adopted the Public Private Partnership (PPP) Model.

Citing the Nigeria integrated Infrastructure Master Plan, he said that the required fund translated to an investment of 100 billion dollars annually on infrastructure.

“PPP projects are therefore, designed to bridge these infrastructure gaps,” he said.

Itemising some of the new PPP projects, Ohiani said: “we have 12 road corridors under the Highway Development and Management Initiative (HDMI) that is meant to address the infrastructure gap.

“The procurement of the concessionaire has started, we have issued 13 Outline Business Case Certificates for the 12 road corridors.

“You also notice that the Lagos-Ibadan rail is working, so also the Itakpe-Warri, in fact, we are about getting a concessionaire for the management of the ticketing and the security for Lagos-Ibadan as well as Itakpe, so we have all these things to bridge the infrastructure gap.”

“We also have the Onitsha River Port that the Federal Executive Council approved a fortnight ago, we also have the Lokoja/Baru port.

“We have the Kano/Kaduna Standard Gauge line currently under construction.

“As we speak, we are working with the Ministry of water resources to add 40 megawatts of power to the power stock across the country,” he said.
He said that the Gurrara 30 megawatts was already ongoing, a testament to the fact that the Federal Government was working toward addressing the infrastructure gap in the country.

On other infrastructural development, he said that the process for the proposed Jabi Lake Tourism and Recreation Development project that would generate N123 billion over a 30-year period had been ramped up.

He said that the project which should have commenced in 2021, was delayed by the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic.

He, however, assured that the tourism driven project which features entertainment, travel, accommodation, cultural activities, eating and gaming, boat cruise and others would soon commence.

The project would also generate net value of N1.5 billion, internal rate of return of 17.75 per cent and payback period of 17 years.

The said project which is expected to cost 21 million dollars would have transformational invaluable multiplier economic effects on the travel and hospitality sector.

ICRC was established to regulate PPP endeavours of the Federal Government aimed at addressing Nigeria’s physical infrastructure deficit which hampers economic development.

Source: News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)