 Now the Nigeria Railway Corporation has stopped services on the Abuja Keduna route following allegations that a path of the train track has been bombed by bandits. A former senator from Keduna State Shea Hosani posted on his verified Twitter handle that bandits attacked a train on the route on Wednesday. The Abuja Keduna train service station manager Pascall-Norley confirmed to a correspondent that there was an attack on the train but could not tell if it was with an explosive. Now investigations are on going to verify the speculation. Now joining us to discuss the bombing in that particular route is Ademo Kabeeru and he is a security consultant. Many thanks for joining us on plus news now as we look at all of these issues tonight. Kabeeru. Thank you and Justin, good evening. Well let's talk about this particular incident that happened today. You know it happened along the Abuja Keduna train route and we've not been able to confirm if there were any casualties but so far if you were to assess whether this really leaves us you know we have been struggling with the issues of insecurity in Nigeria and right now these bandits or these insurgents as it were are now you know attacking in the rail lines. What does this really tell us? So it's I mean it's quite unfortunate the traveller commuters between Abuja and Keduna have for some time been left with only that option. Other options either are not affordable to them that's if the the flight option or if they decide to go by route the risk is too high. So the train service has been more or less the only option for movement between Abuja and Keduna. Now with this development it means commuting between the two cities would be hugely affected. People would have to resort to travelling by route which means the risk that you know they were running away from they've now unfortunately been left with no choice. So number one where does it leave us? It leaves us with a huge gap in terms of the demand for free movement between the two critical parts of the country and our prayer and hope is that the security agencies would respond to this knowing very well that people would now resort to travelling by route and the bandits too are likely to take advantage of the heavy movement on the road. Now in terms of the incident itself I think I've seen several reports from the NRC indicating that apart from slight injury to the driver and one or two persons and there were no major injuries or casualties from the incident but there is the big yawning gap which is the gap of surveillance. We know that that rail track traverses through a forest and area where these bandits have been operating at least for the past five to six years and so the need for surveillance both aerial and you know if it's possible other means of surveillance where the railway corporation would have the knowledge and capability of any breach on the perimeter where that fence is located should have been in place to the extent that when someone breaches the fence and plant plants and a bomb or whatever kind of device on the truck that would have been detected. All right Kabir I just want to take it from where you left off you talked about surveillance and all of that so my question is could these have been averted over time you know that particular location that's the Kaduna Aboja Road has actually been prone to violence you even said that before now most people have avoided using that particular you know the road you know to travel they have resorted you know to you know to the rail line so what have we missed out as a country vis-a-vis the security agencies what have they failed to see and how better could they have handled this you know proactively that is. Yeah so I mean I know there was a time when there was discussion to construct fences around the perimeter of the entire rail track it's a very expensive project and so maybe it was jettisoned however surveillance is absolutely necessary if we are going to restore the confidence of Nigerians to resume using that train beyond surveillance the need for repeat response from what we are told the incident when it happened I think sometime around seven to eight before another locomotive could be deployed it took them almost four to five hours because it was around I think 12 in the morning actually around 1 in the morning that the second locomotive was sent so imagine if the attackers wherever they were their objective was abduction believe me they would have abducted the entire people in that train I know that there are about 10 security personnel you know uniformed ones and then probably a similar number that are in uniformed in the train so maybe they would have put up some form of resistance but where we have a situation where banded 50 to 100 to 150 of them come what would 20 armed you know security personnel do to that that type of numbers so it I mean the good news is that that didn't happen but it's a warning they should tell us that those vulnerabilities that are applicable to rail transportation in Nigeria that we were taking for granted we should enhance the capacity to protect our rail lines better than what we're doing at the moment indeed we need to protect them the rail lines since rail lines that is since the federal government is actually looking in that direction what we tell lots of rail lines and constructed across the country but then again now so just what should we be telling residents who apply that particular route that's the Kaduna Aboja route visa v you know safety and all of that first off is to be vigilant there are telltale signs that will tell you something is wrong especially when you notice reduced you know transportation vehicles on on traffic that is on on the route you would you're likely to sense that something is wrong so anytime commuters notice that it should be a warning second point is as much as possible move in groups I know this is not going to deter the criminals or at least it would be some form of you know protection that means you traveling alone then totally avoid travel at night as much as possible travel during daylight hours and where you can if it's possible reach out to people along the route if you've got contacts and I always say the just wrap up you were going to say something in closer I always say this the national union of road transport workers and you are TW is a very good source of reliable information they've got members across the entire route in all the small parks that are on those routes so try and you know look into that network and see what you can hear from them of course if something is wrong on the road they will know and that would be for you the best bet to avoid traveling on that route so that kind of checks ahead of traveling while you are traveling would be helpful where we can if we know the hotspots then as much as possible if we sense you know no no commuters on the route near the hotspots it's also another one right thank you kabeer vigilant is the way to go all right thank you kabeer Adamu for joining the he's the mdb can consulting and security thanks for sharing your thoughts concerning the protection of rarely a rail line to cross Nigeria we do appreciate your time thank you Justin yeah hello hope you enjoyed the news please do subscribe to our youtube channel and don't forget to hit the notification button so you get notified about fresh news updates