by Isqil Najim
There is a railway extension running into Apapa Port today that, for over a year, existed only on paper. The engineering had been settled. The route was drawn. But a Nigeria Customs Service building stood on the right of way the tracks needed, with impounded contraband piled up behind it. Two federal agencies were involved, and the corridor sat frozen.
Engr. Precious Omosede Ebare was one of the people who helped clear it. As part of the team driving the Lagos Ibadan Rail Project’s extension to Apapa, she was involved in pushing the technical case to the Senate Committee on Land Transportation.
The 6.5 kilometre extension now connects the Lagos Ibadan mainline directly into the Apapa Port terminal, taking freight off Lagos’s choked roads and putting it on rail.
It is the kind of work that rarely shows up in a job title. And it sits at the center of the engineering experience that has just earned Precious Ebare a a Fellowship of the Nigerian Society of Engineers.
Ebare began her engineering journey at Ambrose Alli University in Ekpoma, where she earned a Bachelor of Engineering in Civil Engineering, Second Class Upper.
From there she travelled to Changsha, China, to Central South University, where she completed a Master of Engineering in Civil Engineering and Planning and graduated with Distinctions. Later, she added a Master of Business Administration from Nexford University, in a bid to add management and finance to her skill set.
Ebare never looked back since, and has kept building on that foundation by expanding her knowledge base as technology and the world evolve, training in Engineering Generative AI, critical thinking, health, safety and environment standards, AI powered people management, and more.
Having studied in Changsha, Ebare picked up the language that would later open doors for her in her home country, as she worked between Chinese contractors and Nigerian project teams. This language bridge, in a sector where miscommunication between the two sides has quietly cost projects months and money, made her indispensable and an effective presence in meetings, on site, and in contract negotiations where a misunderstood clause could derail months of work.
Her engineering career took her through two of the largest Chinese construction firms working in Nigeria: CCECC Nigeria Limited and CRCC Construction Company, where she moved through a wide spread of roles including Project Manager, Head of Document Control, Section Manager, Assistant Station Manager, and Contract Engineer/Interpreter.
Across these roles, and her later work at TEAM Nigeria Limited, she contributed significantly to some of Nigeria’s most consequential rail projects: the Lagos Ibadan Rail Project and its extension to Apapa Port, the Kaduna Kano Rail Project, the Lagos Light Rail Project, and the APM Terminal Building and Yard Works.
During the Lagos Ibadan expansion, sophisticated signalling and telecommunications equipment went up at the Ibadan station hub, but there was no dedicated power supply to run it. Without that power, the equipment would sit installed and unusable.
Ebare was among those who pushed federal authorities to secure the power infrastructure needed to bring the signalling online. The trains ran safely as a result. It is the unglamorous half of infrastructure delivery.
On the Kaduna Kano Standard Gauge Railway Project, Ebare and her team developed the Standard Operating Procedure governing the construction of the track and its ancillary works. She also contributed significantly to the technical and construction handbook produced for the project.
A relentless team worker, she was part of the team that wrote the rules a major national corridor will be built and maintained by, a meaningful mark to leave on an industry where institutional knowledge often disappears between project cycles.
She also brought value engineering into the project by identifying sustainable materials and methods that stretched the budget without compromising on what the railway needed to be.
Today, Precious Ebare is Project Manager for the Kano Kaduna Standard Gauge Railway Project under TEAM Nigeria Limited, overseeing more than 150 staff and the full range of construction and contractual activity from Kano to Kaduna.
The role asks for engineering judgment, patience with government processes, fluency with international contractors, and the discipline to keep a project of this scale moving without losing the details.
Ebare, ever ready to share knowledge, has also taken her experience into classrooms. In early 2025, she was part of a TEAM Nigeria delegation to the Federal University of Transportation in Daura, Africa’s first specialised transportation university, where she contributed to masterclasses on the lifecycle of transportation infrastructure, feasibility studies, and environmental and social impact assessments.
She has volunteered and facilitated with the Millennium Development Goals programme, and has published and unpublished research and technical papers extending her contribution to the profession beyond active project sites. Within APWEN and NSE, she has also been active.
On June 4, 2026, the Nigerian Society of Engineers, under the leadership of Engr. Ali Rabiu, recognised Precious Omosede Ebare, along with hundreds of other distinguished engineers across the country, as a Fellow of the Society.
She is a COREN registered engineer, a Fellow of the Nigerian Society of Engineers, and a member of the Nigerian Institution of Civil Engineers, the Nigerian Institution of Management, the Project Management Institute, and an active member of the Association of Professional Women Engineers of Nigeria.
But to Precious Ebare, this is not the end. She remains on track to achieve more greatness in the profession and beyond.