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General Electric Company (GE), a U.S.-based multinational conglomerate, has said it is pulling out of the concession deal it had with the Federal Government of Nigeria to maintain and operate the country's narrow-gauge rail lines.

Last year, GE had won a contract to manage Nigeria’s narrow-gauge rail network in partnership with three other companies, namely, Transnet, Dutch-based APM Terminals and Sinohydro Consortium. And in April 2018, the Federal Government signed a $45 million interim phase agreement with GE for the concession of narrow-gauge rail lines in the country.

Bloomberg reported on Wednesday that GE’s decision to pull out of the rail concession is in tandem with its strategy to exit the transportation business. CEO of GE, John Flannery, had announced on November 13, 2017, that the company will sell its transport, industrial solutions, current and lighting business, and more than 10 other transactions in the next two years.

According to GE, the rail concession agreements are now being negotiated by Transnet SOC Ltd – a South African rail, port and pipeline company – and Chinese state-owned hydropower engineering and construction company, Sinohydro. GE will now focus on other areas of infrastructure development in Nigeria such as health care and power.

The concession deal was expected to cover about 3,500 kilometres of existing narrow-gauge lines from Lagos to Kano and from Port Harcourt to Maiduguri.