Controversy over ‘attempt to steal train coaches’ in Borno

The police command in Borno says it has arrested six suspects over an attempt to steal three train coaches at the Maiduguri railway terminus.

Lawan Yusuf, the Borno commissioner of police, said suspects were arrested on Saturday after a distress call about the attempted theft of the train coaches. 

Yusuf said one Aliyu Mai Nasara, the principal suspect, was accosted while coordinating the loading of three coaches into trucks. 

“There was a distress call received from railway quarters. Loader trailers were sighted at the railway terminus in Maiduguri evacuating and loading properties belonging to NRC,”  Yusuf told NTA. 

“The properties include; three coaches. On the receipt of that information, the divisional police officer mobilised his men behind railway quarters. 

“One Aliyu Mai Nasara was arrested. Mai Nasara claimed that he is the director of the north-east district headquartered in Bauchi and that he was assigned by the MD of the Nigerian railway corporation to come and evacuate coaches to Plateau State, where according to him, the railway corporation wanted to hand it over to plateau state government, to initiate intra railway transport within Jos metropolis. 

“But the suspect has no identity to certify his claim that he’s actually the district manager of the northeast district Bauchi.”

The police commissioner said the principal suspect is now at large.

However, Mahmood Yakubu, spokesperson of the NRC, told TheCable that the news was not true. 

In a statement issued on X, the management of NRC also debunked the attempted theft of the train coaches.

“The attention of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) has been drawn to a news trending on numerous social media platforms purported to have emanated from Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), in which it was reported that attempt was made to steal NRC coaches from Maiduguri,” the statement reads.

“NRC management wishes to clarify this as erroneous, stating that the said coaches are officially being moved to NRC Running Shed Jos, Plateau State to be overhauled. With the view of putting them back to operation. NRC is trying to extend Rail Mass Transit all over the country.”