The Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) says there is need for strategic actions towards achieving sustainable transport development in Africa.
The Acting Transport Secretary, FCTA, Mr Yahaya Usman, made the call at the 4th Africa Sustainable Urban Mobility (SUM) Course in Abuja on Monday.
The theme of the event is ”Developing Walking, Cycling and Public Transport as Hope of Africas Transportation Future.”
Usman said transportation as major enabler of socio-political and economic development required continuous innovations to cope with the dynamics of the changing world.
According to him, the pace of global transformation and innovations in urban transport in particular are so rapid that if we are not careful, in few years to come, African cities will lose their competitiveness.
Usman was represented by Mr Dele Yaro, Deputy Director, Operations, Directorate of Road Traffic Services, Mabushi.
He explained that transport developments at the pace of the rest of the world could not be achieved without cognate and current knowledge.
”It is noteworthy that transport and mobility is key to the wellbeing and socio-economic development of citizens and the nation, therefore, its quality, adequacy and efficiency are critical.
“‘Already, Africa is confronted with enormous challenges limiting its pace of development; from poverty, to disease, infrastructure deficits and a host of other issues limiting our development.
”Dealing with all of these require strategic actions to which sustainable transport development is central.
”This is why appropriate human resources expertise must be developed to provide the needed transformation,” he said.
The Secretary commended the organisers of the capacity building course while expressing the administration ‘s commitment to continue to partner Ochenuel Mobility and its collaborators in the noble initiative.
”We remain committed to quality, efficient and sustainable transport development reflective of a model city.
”We shall ensure that the knowledge acquired by our personnel participating in this course is expeditiously put to use in the ongoing and future development of Abuja urban mobility.
”We also hope to keep the relationship with the organisers to draw from their wealth of knowledge in ensuring that Abuja fulfil its vision of a competitive city that is the pride of all Africans,” he said.
The Director, SUM Course, Mr Emmanuel John, said the training was aimed at building the capacity of stakeholders in the transport and urban mobility sub-sector of the transport industry.
”We are looking at developing efficient public transport system, cycling, walking and Technology enhancements and ensuring electrification of vehicles.
”So that our transport system can be fit for today and for future generations without pollution/ emissions affecting climate change and then efficiency and cost effectiveness can come in and everyone CN use the road.
”We have participants from across Africa here to look at all of the issues.
”After we have learned sufficiently from each and everyone, we’ll come up with a policy recommendation that is going to be available to city authorities to adopt and then we’ll have better transportation system for Africa,” John said.
Mr Mahmood Muhammad, Commissioner of Housing and Transportation, Kano, on his part stressed the need for a regulatory framework in our cities for transportation mobility to be implemented.
Muhammad said poor infrastructure provision also posed as a major challenge of Transport mobility in our cities. (NAN)
