The Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) said it conveyed 6,659 passengers via the Abuja-Kaduna route during the Easter celebrations from Thursday to Monday.
The Station Manager, Victor Adamu, disclosed this in Abuja on Tuesday.
“On Thursday last week, we ran our normal trips and we carried 1,744 passengers. On Good Friday, we had 1,807 passengers and on Saturday, we had only one trip with 685 passengers on board.
“We also had one trip on Sunday with 581 passengers on board. Meanwhile, we resumed our full trips on Easter Monday with 1,842 passengers making the trips.
“On the whole, we had 6,659 passengers during this Easter season,” he said.
Adamu, however, debunked the allegation of overselling of tickets, explaining that the population of people making use of the train during the airport closure was overwhelming.
“Train officials do not oversell tickets to passengers,” he said.
He attributed the congestion to the free airport train services and the pressure mounted on officials by passengers who would insist on going with the train in spite of it being full in order not to miss their flights.
“The inflow of passengers going to the airport is too much, especially at the Kubwa station.
“Once the train arrives, all of them will just go in and you cannot stop them, because they are not paying; they will usually accuse you of wanting them to miss their flights.
“So, we can’t do anything than to allow them because the population of passengers these few weeks had been overwhelming,” he said.
The manager, however, said that the issue of congestion would be over as soon as the Abuja airport reopened.