The recent announcement by the Federal Government to launch the first batch of approximately 5,600 "palliative" compressed natural gas and electric vehicles ahead of President Bola Tinubu’s first administration anniversary has sparked debate within the Nigerian automotive industry.
Onanuga highlighted that the PCNGI committee’s plan to deploy “CNG buses and tricycles aims to have at least one million natural gas-driven vehicles on Nigerian roads by 2027,” marking a significant transition in the country’s transportation sector. The preference for SKD assembly, almost akin to importing fully built vehicles and merely assembling them locally, has been widely criticised as contrary to the spirit of NAIDP-2023.
Obi also contested the planned production of 6,000 units this year and one million by 2027, based on SKD, highlighting the irony given NAIDP-2023’s aim to transition from SKD to CKD manufacturing over the next decade. He further remarked, “How were the companies that won the contracts even selected? Was there a transparent bid process? If so, how come an entirely new assembly plant that is yet to commence operation was awarded the contract for the assembly of tricycles? What roles are the existing and popular bus assemblers and manufacturers with pedigree playing in the entire presidential CNG initiative?”
Amidst these controversies, managers from PAN, Kaduna, and ANAMMCO, Enugu, revealed they were not invited to bid, while the Chairman of Innoson Vehicle Manufacturing Co Ltd, Dr. Innocent Chukwuma, expressed dismay at being overlooked despite Innoson’s track record in CNG bus production. Osigwe, through a press release, urged the committee to clarify whether preferred bidders existed and why auto plants with substantial capacities to manufacture buses on CKD bases were not offered equal bidding opportunities.
Ejindu attributed the failure to adopt the CKD option to the absence of a NAMA member on the Presidential committee. He referenced a past collaboration between his company and TSS to assemble thousands of Shacman trucks for Dangote as a precedent in the local industry.Before flagging, please keep in mind that Disqus does not moderate communities. Your username will be shown to the moderator, so you should only flag this comment for one of the reasons listed above.