Less than 72 hours after the Presidential Committee on Port Reforms led by the Special Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan on Project Monitoring and Evaluation, Prof. Sylvester Monye reversed itself on the directive to stop daytime transfer of containers, the decision has turned out to be counter-productive.
The decision was conveyed to stakeholders by Tuesday after the committee’s meeting on Monday, June18, 2012, but by the following day, scores of containers that had disappeared from the Apapa end of the very busy Apapa Oshodi expressway reappeared.
Less than 72 hours after the Presidential Committee on Port Reforms led by the Special Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan on Project Monitoring and Evaluation, Prof. Sylvester Monye reversed itself on the directive to stop daytime transfer of containers, the decision has turned out to be counter-productive.
The decision was conveyed to stakeholders by Tuesday after the committee’s meeting on Monday, June18, 2012, but by the following day, scores of containers that had disappeared from the Apapa end of the very busy Apapa Oshodi expressway reappeared.
By, Thursday and Friday last week, the heavy and chaotic vehicular traffic that was prevalent at the two approaches to Lagos ports have resurfaced as long queues of trucks laden with empty containers have resurfaced.
The committee had bowed to what the chairman, technical sub-committee of the presidential committee, Prince Olayiwola Shittu confirmed as the intense pressure mounted on the committee by some interested groups and reversed the order it gave about three weeks ago, and which was a follow-up on the May 13, 2012 directive of the Lagos state government and the committee to rid the approaches to Lagos ports of traffic congestion.
Shipping Position Daily learnt on Friday that the committee and its apparatuses are already overwhelmed by the build-up of container-laden trucks and could no longer identify which container was empty and which truck was coming from the holding bays of the shipping companies and which one was coming to load.
The latest confusion was the outcome of a meeting between the presidential committee and representatives of shipping companies, truck operators, terminal operators, customs agents and the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) last Monday.
At the end of the meeting, the Prof Monye-led committee recapitulated and decided that trucks laden with empty containers belonging to importers could thenceforth come into the ports at any time of the day, and also directed that empty containers from shipping companies’ holding bays will only be allowed to be brought into the port only at night.
Confirming counter effect of the directive summersault to our correspondent last weekend that the pressure was too much, even though he didn’t divulge the source of the pressure to us.
“The road has gone back to what it was, the traffic gridlock is back, but it was good that we rescinded, because we all can now see”, he lamented.
He however confirmed that the committee is outing together a stakeholders’ forum soon to examine all the issues concerning cargo clearance and delivery in the ports.
The Committee will use the opportunity of the meeting to unfold its panacea for effective cargo clearance in the ports, we will also find a permanent solution to the trucks issue, because it is obvious that the new approach will cause more problem, we may have to go back to the previous regime to save the roads”, he stressed.
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