The National Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO) has accused the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) of unprofessional conducts in the granting of licenses to tank farms in the Apapa and Kirikiri axis in Lagos without truck holding bays.
The association said this recently in Lagos in a chat with Shipping Position Daily.
According to the Lagos State Vice Chairman, dry cargo of NARTO; Alhaji Abdullahi Inuwa, those that have holding bays no longer make use of their bays because they place little or no value on the lives of the citizens.
He also accused DPR of issuing more licenses to people to build more thank farms even when it is clear that there is little or no space for their activities to be properly carried out.
According to him, "DPR is the government regulatory agency on oil tank farms and depots in Nigeria. But the attitude of those in charge has been unprofessional when it comes to approval of tank farms in Apapa and Kirikiri axis without truck holding bays. Even those that have holding bays no longer use them; reasons are that they don't value citizens’ lives. You can imagine from Coconut up to Kirikiri town is not more than 50 metres distance away from all the oil deport to the residential areas.
He also accused the private spot owners of collecting money form their customers for product that is not available in their storage and issue tanker drivers with loading tickets causing them to park on the express road.
"A tanker driver once told me that any tanker you see parked on the service lane has paid for the number of days he will stay on the road and they can be there as long as they pay the money till the time they load. The question here is who are the people collecting the money on federal government roads" he concluded.
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