A group under the aegis of Apapa Youth Truck Owners (AYTO) has blasted the management of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and clearing agents of deceiving their members with the Terminal Delivery Order (TDO).
The group is a creation of all the truckers association, including the Association of Maritime Truck Owners ( AMRTO ), Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO) among other associations.
In an exclusive interview with Shipping Position Daily last week in Lagos, the Secretary General of the Committee, Mr. Yakubu Kolawole, said that the one of the major reasons there seems to be a breakdown of trucks especially, along Lagos roads is that most times what the NPA and agents declare as the weight of the goods they are to carry is normally above what they declared.
He explained that they might write in the TDO that what you are about to carry is 20tons, but when you get to the terminal you find out that the weight might be even more than 30 tons, thereby causing a major challenge for their trucks adding that bad roads is another challenge they are having.
“Yes, there is more to do, the roads should be put in shape let us have motor able roads, it is the first issue that is causing the menace.
Secondly from our part as truckers, let the federal government intervene because the load they are giving us, that is the Terminal Delivery Order (TDO) that we are using inside the terminal, what they declare in the TDO is not what we see. They will tell you that what you are going to carry is say, 20tons, but you discover that it is more than what they declared in the document and we don’t have the capacity to investigate, because we were not there when they declared it. What is in the TDO is bigger than what they tell us which means that, directly or indirectly they are giving us more than what we can carry ” , he stated.
Also speaking on the proposed strike by truckers, he fingered extortion by the Nigerian Navy as the major reason they are embarking on the strike, even as he added that instead of the Navy to help in sanitizing the ports, they are causing more problems to the users.
“The main purpose of the strike we want to go on is the Navy around the ports, they are actually the major cause of the problems we are having in the ports. We thought they are there to sanitize the ports and its environs, but the reverse if the case. Presently they are using it as a business, before our trucks can assess the ports you will pay nothing less than N20, 000, they have turned it into a business center and we cannot even approach them or come close to them because they are military men. Then those are the problems, we have evidences everywhere”, he concluded.
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