The Port Manager of the Tin Can Island Port, Engineer Emmanuel Akpoherhe has challenged truck owners and drivers with evidence of extortion against any official to come up with such.
Engineer Akpoherhe, said this on Monday when he paid a visit to the site of the rehabilitation work going on at Tin Can ‘First Gate’ on the Apapa Oshodi expressway.
He challenged truckers to make available evidence either as a voice record or a video of the extortion taking place, adding that NPA can only act with evidence.
He also warned officials with such tendency to desist from such, stressing that the management of NPA has zero tolerance to extortion and will deal decisively with anyone caught.
"The truth is that all these allegations they always come up ,but what we tell them is this, giving allegation is not enough, you must back it up with evidence. Either by recording the person taking the bribe or taking pictures of the person. The NPA management is highly against that. We want evidence we cannot just jump into the road and accuse people without evidence so it is the evidence that we need", he stated.
He also applauded the Managing Director of NPA, Hadiza Bala Usman, for her zero tolerance to extortion, saying that NPA staff are encouraged to work with such an MD.
"As soon as we catch the person (extortionist), what will happen to the person is better said than done. If you look at the Managing Director of NPA now, you will see that she has a zero tolerance for corruption and we are encouraged that we have such a person. So because of that there is no need to even tell you what will happen if you are caught but I can assure you it will not go well with such a person", he added.
He applauded the ports’ road reconstruction, saying that it will stand the test of time even as he insisted on the importance of getting holding bays.
"If you look at the quality of work going on at that Apapa road, you will know that it will stand the test of time. But the issue of holding bays must be addressed if not, no matter how good the road is it will still come back to status quo", he said.
Speaking further, he fingered the non-availability of holding bays as the major challenge the roads are having.
He also maintained that with a good and functional holding bay the road will last longer.
"On the issue of holding bays, we are actually going for a meeting about that now. I think that is the measure issue the unavailability of holding bays. You can even see if these roads are good, if you look at the number of trucks here there will still be no assess because there holding bay are not available and functional"
"So by the time we have food holding bays when the roads are fixed you will be surprised that all these gridlocks will be a thing of the past"
He said that the repair of the road is beyond them that is why they have decided to support by putting palliatives.
"The road repair is beyond us we learnt that contract has been giving on that regards I don't know the details but very soon they are going to sort these things out. But for us we just want to put some palliative measure before the full work is done"
The TCIP boss also said that the situation of the road is an issue that concerns everybody from the local to the federal government and the stakeholders.
Meanwhile a trucker, Mr. Obinna Ogu, called on the management of NPA to come to truckers’ rescue by ensuring that the roads are motorable.
He also lamented constant extortion by some government agencies attached to the ports.
"The challenges we are facing here is enormous he first is traffic there is no good road. Upon that some of the government agencies are collecting money from us from N25, 000- N60, 000 before they will allow a trailer to go for leading either at first gate or second. The NPA are there, Police and so many of them and they do not wear uniform.
He also called on the government to put w permanent solution to the problem by repairing the roads instead of patching them.
"I want the government to look into it and repair this road and not patching the roads. This is a federal road the federal government should be the people repairing this road. Apart from the trucks people that are working here are also suffering. Many of the people working here have parked out because of bad roads. The masses are suffering when we have federal government. It takes us more than one week to assess the ports at times. Our drivers sleep on the road for one week at times just to assess the ports" he said.
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