The Kano state government has explained that the Kanawa Bus Service scheme ,which was introduced by former governor Abdullahi Ganduje, who procured 100 shuttle buses at the sum of N2.5 billion, failed due to “poor planning.”
The state government also said that it did not roll out the Kanawa buses for public use because it is waiting to formulate a “Transport Policy” to guide the vehicles’ operations.
This was revealed by the state’s Commissioner of Transport, Muhammad Diggol in an exclusive interview with Daily News 24 on Friday.
The commissioner said the Abba Kabir Yusuf-led administration has organized a stakeholders’ meeting to be held on 5th and 6th June, 2024, where submissions would be received to develop the proposed “Transport Policy” in the state.
He said the “Transport Policy Dialogue” would bring together participants from the private sector to address all transportation-related issues.
Mr Diggol, disclosed that the Ganduje administration could not implement its planned mass transit scheme in the state “due to poor planning”.
According to him, “It is true that the last administration procured 100 high capacity buses ranging from 45 seater and 50 seater for mass transit in the state.
“They had arranged to start but there was a level of poor planning. So, immediately they started, there were a lot of challenges that arose that necessitated them to stop.
“We inherited those problems. The buses right now are at Mahaha playground at BUK road,” he said.
The commissioner added that the previous government had wanted to engage private consultants in public transportation to run the buses at certain rates to get revenues to pay back the loan they had secured to purchase the vehicles.
“But ultimately, they ended up releasing the buses on a lease which was against the initial plan.
“Secondly, there are six access roads or corridors namely Gwarzo road, Zaria road, Maiduguri road, Hadejia road, Katsina road and Madobi road.
“There is also a terminal at Yan Kura in Fagge area. So the whole idea was to use those buses to evacuate people from those corridors and ultimately terminate at Yan Kura, which is located at the central business area of Kano,” he said.
Mr Diggol added that past government had planned to evacuate other vehicles particularly tricycles from those corridors but “there was a problem when the tricycle riders went on strike so they had to stop.
“When we came in, we knew that mass transit was a necessity because that was the only way to move many people at the same time at once. And secondly, the buses can reduce both noise and air pollution.
“But we wanted to look at it holistically. So, we are developing a transport policy for the state looking at every strata of the transportation sector,” he said.
The commissioner, however stated that some of the vehicles have been deployed as part of the government’s Kano Girl Child Initiative in order to ease transportation hardship for female pupils and students of public schools.
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Daily News 24 recalls that in October 2022, Mr Ganduje had procured a total of 100 shuttle buses which were named ‘Kanawa Bus Service’ as part of moves to introduce a public mass transit system.
The then governor also purchased 50 taxis which were distributed to empower youths on a hire-purchase arrangement.
Mr Ganduje had revealed that the 100 “high-capacity” buses were procured at the cost of N2.5 billion.
He explained that “the service was to be operated by private operator to ensure efficiency and effective management on a public-private partnership”.
“To achieve this directives, we have directed the state investment and properties limited to invest in the new taxis and give to on hire purchase to the members of the Tricycle associations to be displaced from the pilot corridor.
“This component of the scheme will be revolving until all the corridors are fully covered by this service,” Mr Ganduje had said.
