The federal government has pledged to provide a 50 per cent subsidy to transportation unions for compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicle conversion kits.
Transportation unions to benefit in the pilot phase of the programme are members of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW), Road Transport Employer Association of Nigeria (RTEAN) and Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO).
This was made known by the programme director and chief executive officer of the Presidential Initiative on CNG, Micheal Oluwagbemi.
According to him, the federal government has procured over 20,000 conversion kits that would soon be deployed.
Explaining the choice of the unions, he said it is because they are the operators in the road transport sector providing 90 per cent of the transportation in the country to members of the public.
Oluwagbemi said the conversion kits will be available to the transport unions at a 50 percent discount, while installation cost is free.
“We are already negotiating with our partners who will initiate that project in the next week,” he said, adding that eight conversion centres in four states, namely Kwara, Lagos, FCT, and Rivers would pilot the programme.
