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Nigeria is collaborating with Japan and Israel in the area of assembling electric cars.
The country is doing this through the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI).
Already, NASENI has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Japanese and Israeli companies to set up an electric car assembly and manufacturing plant by 2023.
Speaking at the MoU signing ceremony in Abuja the Executive Vice Chairman of NASENI, Professor Mohammed Haruna, noted that the signing of the agreement meant that Nigeria would be domesticating the technologies involved in the agreement.
Haruna, who lauded the collaboration, however, lamented that earlier attempts at domesticating some forms of technologies, especially automobiles, by Nigeria had been defeated by continuous vehicle importation by dealers.
He said with this new project, manufacturing of Nigerian-made electrical vehicles would begin in the nearest future.
“The first attempt to domesticate certain technologies in this country, especially in the automobile industry, has not worked with continuous importation.
“NASENI has come into this now with the perfect partners, Japanese and Israeli companies, their technologies are proven and known.
“But most importantly, Nigeria will not just be consuming this technology, we are here to make sure that we domesticate, produce and manufacture in Nigeria. “We are grateful and we are happy with this collaboration and we assure Nigerians that the automobile industry after this collaboration will not be the same again,” he said.
Israeli Ambassador to Nigeria, Michael Freeman, who also witnessed the signing ceremony, said the partnership, which was a combination of Israeli, Japanese and Nigerian technologies, would help address the many challenges affecting the transport and environmental sectors in Nigeria.
“It is a project that is a partnership with Israeli, Japanese and Nigerian companies taking place in Nigeria.
“What is special about this project is that it is a timely project that combines Israeli technologies, Japanese technologies, Nigerian entrepreneurship and innovation together to create a project that is going to work fabulously.
“We are talking about bringing electronic Motorcycles into Nigeria which will be a programme that is green, environmentally friendly. It offers people a cheap way and safe way of transport and even has the technology to ensure that the motorcycles are only used for legal and appropriate purposes.
“When we look at what the problems are in the world and in also in Africa and in Nigeria, we are talking about issues of fuel scarcity, we are talking about green technology, we are talking about the need to provide cleaner, cheaper, easier transport,” he explained.(VON)
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