Meanwhile , reactions have trailed Lagos state Governor, Mr Akinwumi Ambode’s disclosure that the state will set up a bus assembly plant for the purpose of assembling buses for the states transport scheme; the LAGBUS.
Maritime experts have urged the state to expand the assembly plant to cover but intra and intercity bus service.
In a chat with Shipping Position Daily in Lagos last week, the Acting Executive Director of the Chartered Institute of Transport and Logistics, Mr. Paul Ndibe, who applauded the move, also harped on the need to extend the bus for both inter and intra city services.
“Well anything that is investment will attract some level of employment generation. But then the critical thing is the nature of the buses to be assembled here in Lagos state and then not just to assemble but to create the capacity to maintain. So my reaction will just be let it not be only the Lagos market that is being targeted for purposes of intra-city bus services. Let us extend it to both inter and intra city services by having a standard manufacturer that can grow the capacity to even maintain and then to develop the capacity to not just assemble but also to manufacture that is the critical part”, he said.
He also charged the state government to ensure that the necessary policies are put in place for the smooth operation of the assembly plant.
“So if there are standard of rules on our roads for some certain level of buses it will make sense but there are no policies on that yet. So the capacity of the buses in question nobody knows. The buses are essentially for intra-city and service that does not mean that they cannot go inter-city”
Mr. Ndibe also challenged the government to go into full manufacturing of vehicles instead of setting up assembly plants.
“Take for example the buses, say there are 1000 of those buses in Lagos, the capital outlay might be attractive enough to establish a manufacturing company of those buses here in Lagos state. So why don’t we go for manufacturing plants instead of assembly plants. In that case we will look into our sales sector and know what we should do in other to create a capacity for that. Because this should be a long term investment perspective instead of this short term investment perspective to just assemble and use. Why don’t we manufacture, so that is my reaction” he said
Also speaking on the same issue, president of Shippers Association, Lagos State (SALS), Rev Jonathan Nicol charged the state to move the assembly plant out of the state metropolis, stressing that the state is already congested.
Rev. Nicol also re-emphasized on the need to have a car manufacturing company instead of an assembly plant in the country.
“Well they used to have an assembly plant along Badagry axis to it is not new to the state maybe because as at that time it was under the federal government profile. But now if the state government wants to assemble vehicles in Lagos, then they need to move out of the state because already Lagos is over congested. Then there is need for us not only to assembly cars here but to manufacture our own cars. You cannot import components of vehicles and put them together and say made in Nigeria it is very wrong. We should be able to build our own engines and all that. We should have all these parts manufacturing companies first. I think politicians are good at introducing things. So that is our own opinion it is nothing bad if they want to introduce an assembly plant in Lagos state but the state as it is today is over congested”, he concluded .
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