Anxiety Over Fuel Supply As Tanker Drivers Vacate Expressway, Tank Farms

 Notwithstanding the assurances that it will not lead to scarcity of petroleum products, there are fears that last week’s evacuation of articulated vehicles, including trucks will precipitate scarcity of the essential product.
Already, some labour groups ion the maritime and oil and gas sectors have started giving signals that they are not quite comfortable with the directive that was jointly handed down to then by the Lagos state government and the presidential committee on port reforms.

 Notwithstanding the assurances that it will not lead to scarcity of petroleum products, there are fears that last week’s evacuation of articulated vehicles, including trucks will precipitate scarcity of the essential product.
Already, some labour groups ion the maritime and oil and gas sectors have started giving signals that they are not quite comfortable with the directive that was jointly handed down to then by the Lagos state government and the presidential committee on port reforms.
The first group to express disdain for the order is  the Association of Maritime Truck Owners (AMATO),  which last week withdrew its services and stayed away from the seaports following the federal and Lagos Stage governments’ directives to them to cease parking along the seaport road, Oshodi-Apapa Expressway.
 The chairman of AMATO, Chief Remi Ogungbemi said the tanker drivers had withdrawn their services from the ports for now as the government directives were too frustrating.
“Government is second to God. They have asked us to leave the road and we have left. But the frustration we are having now is that the Lagos State Government has given us another directive this afternoon to leave the space at Lilypond.
“We have therefore withdrawn our services from the ports. We are not on strike but we have decided to withdraw our services from the ports.
The other group that expressed helplessness over the quit notice if the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers Union (NUPENG)whose South West coordinator , Alhaji Nojeem Korodo stated last week in reaction to the government order that in as much as the union was ready to comply with the government’s directive, the absence of holding  bays for trucks could task the resolve of his members.
He told our correspondent that tanker drivers are already finding things difficult as there isd no where to pa\rk their trucks while waiting to loads products from the tank farms in Apapa.