The sole administrator of the Ajaokuta Steel Company, Engr. Sumaila Aka’aba, has disclosed that the Russians are expected to upgrade and modernize the steel plant during the rehabilitation period which is expected to commence soon.
He lamented that the restrictions on airspace as a result of convid-19 pandemic has led to loss of four months in the arrival plan of the Russians engineers.
Aka’aba who stated this at the steel plant in Ajaokuta while interacting with Journalists, said that the technical audit carried out in 2018 indicated that the status of the steel plant stood at 93.5 percent, saying that as at today the steel industry is ready for rehabilitation works to be carried out by the Russians.
On the claims in some quarters that Ajaokuta steel plant is obsolete, the sole administrator said that the integrated plant is technically intact and will bounce back once the rehabilitation works are carried out.
“Initially, you hear that Ajaokuta steel plant is 98 per cent completed , but today it has come down to 95.3 per cent which was clearly stated in a twelve volume documents we used to discuss with Russian government when President Muhammadu Buhari visited the country last year.
“It is also the document we used to engaged the Russians and they have made proposals on what to do in Ajaokuta steel company and that is why they will be coming to the steel plant to revalidate the technical audit to be sure that our claims on the status of the plant are correct and in order” he stated.
“Hopefully as soon as the airspace restriction is over, the Russians will come back and do revalidation of the audit report submitted to them to confirm what we said about Ajaokuta steel plant status, after fourth years they left the plant.
“After the revalidation they can now put pen on paper so that the project proper can commence” he noted.
Speaking further on the issue of obsolesce of some of the equipment in the steel plant as erroneously claimed in some quarters, the Sole administrator said that the items used in building the steel plant was of high quality and standard that can be found anywhere in the world.
He added that the Ajaokuta steel plant, just like any other plant in the world can be upgraded and modernized to suite the present technological advancement.
“The proposal from TyazhPromoExport (TPE) the original builder of the plant who is representing Russian government is to upgrade, modernize and complete the remaining part of the steel complex for optimum utilization to enable the two government involve recover their capital investment”
He commended the staff of the company for their commitment towards ensuring that the plant maintained it status, assuring them that very the steel complex would bounce back to life.
