Yuletide: Tinubu cuts transport fare by 50%

As a gesture of goodwill and compassion for his fellow Nigerians, President Bola Tinubu has announced a 50 percent slash in the fares of land transport across the nation from today until January 4, 2024.

The President has also given a green light for free train rides in all the states of the Union during the same time frame.

However, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC, has rejected the move as impractical, saying the government cannot impose low fares by force.

Mr. Dele Alake, the Minister of Solid Minerals Development and the head of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Presidential Intervention, revealed this while addressing the State House reporters at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

Alake was accompanied by the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, the Minister of Transportation, Saidu Alkali, and the Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga. Alake said that the Minister of Transportation, the transport unions, and the luxury bus operators had all agreed on the logistics of the implementation.

The luxury buses have 22 routes for inter-state travel.

He said: “President Tinubu, in another show of his affection for Nigerians, has approved that the Federal Government should step in to reduce the cost of public transport to enable our compatriots who want to travel to see their loved ones and hometowns to do so without hassle and the extra pressure caused by the high cost of transport during this period.

“The President is fully aware of the recent hike in the cost of interstate transport and even air travel. It is a tradition for our people to travel during Christmas and the end of the year to be with families and friends, and this has been the norm for ages.

“We also understand that globally, intra-country movements and flows of people, goods, and services always reach their peak around Christmas and the end of the year because of the social attraction of the period, which transporters always exploit to increase fares tremendously.

“In recognition of the economic situation of the country, which he is working very hard to improve, President Tinubu wants Nigerians to be able to travel within Nigeria to wherever they want to go to meet their loved ones without the extra burden of paying excessively for inter-state public transport.

“This special presidential intervention will start Thursday, December 21. It will end on January 4, 2024.

“From tomorrow (today), Nigerians who want to embark on inter-state travel to any part of the country from Abuja, Lagos, Kano, Kaduna, Enugu, Port Harcourt, Owerri, Ibadan, Akure, Maiduguri, Sokoto, and other major inter-state transport hubs will be able to do so at half the price.”

Explaining the rationale for involving luxury bus unions, the Minister of State for Transport, Saedu Alkali, said: “We decided to use luxury bus unions because they are more organised and more structured. We had a meeting with the president of the union, and they gave us an idea of how much they charge on a normal day, but during festive times, when the buses travel, they return empty, which is why they have to increase the fare during festivities. That has been taken into account. We had several meetings with Mr. President.

“And we decided to have 50 percent for the land transport because we have to be mindful of the security situation. If we say it is free, even those who did not plan to travel will just go to the park and say they want to travel. But with this 50 percent, they have the ticketing system.