Despite the claim by the Nigerian Port Authority (NPA) that it has set up an inter-agency Traffic Management and Enforcement team, their presence is yet to be seen as truck drivers yesterday demonstrated at the Tin Can Island Port over the alleged ‘one-way’ driving by some of their colleagues.
The truck drivers also demonstrated against the activities of some security agencies, especially the Police for allegedly collecting bribe and allowing some trucks to drive against traffic on the way to Tin Can Port.
The peaceful demonstration took place along Tin Can interchange to port access road and down to Coconut bus stop.
Shipping Position Daily recalls that the NPA had last week flagged-off measures critical to the effective management of the traffic situation along the two approaches to Apapa and Tin Can ports.
One of the measures which were expected to have taken effect from November 23, 2017, is that: all shipping companies must house their empty trucks at their holding bays outside of the port location pending the time for vessel loading.
To control the traffic, NPA also warned that tramping trucks milling around in search of customers within the Port Area will be impounded by the inter-agency Traffic Management and Enforcement Team comprising of Nigerian Police, Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Lagos State Transport Management Agency (LASTMA), the Nigerian Navy, the National Civil Defence Corps and NPA Security.
But speaking with Shipping Position Daily yesterday in Lagos, Chairman of Dry Cargo section of the National Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO) Alhaji Inua Mohammed said that all these are yet to materialize, because some of the trucks are still being allowed to drive against traffic right from Berger Yard at Mile 2 down to Tin Can Port.
"Because of the bad roads, some of the drivers took one way, and they refused to leave a lane for the outgoing trucks, they blocked the entire roads and this was why we had some issues, our men with the police collectively intervened by clearing some of the trucks in order to pave way for others to pass"
"The traffic was coming down from Berger yard, the police allowed them to pass through there" he said.
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