The Joint Council Of Seaports Trucker [JCOST] is a new maritime truck owners amalgamated body which is saddled with the responsibilities of protecting the interests of transporters and Mr.Kayode Odunowo is the chairman of that group. In this interview with Shipping Position Daily correspondent, Roland Ekama, he talked about the group’s achievement and the challenges of truckers in the maritime industry.
What led to the setting up of JCOST?
The Joint Council Of Seaports Trucker [JCOST] is a new maritime truck owners amalgamated body which is saddled with the responsibilities of protecting the interests of transporters and Mr.Kayode Odunowo is the chairman of that group. In this interview with Shipping Position Daily correspondent, Roland Ekama, he talked about the group’s achievement and the challenges of truckers in the maritime industry.
What led to the setting up of JCOST?
The essence of setting up JCOST is to help our members and before now we had various associations with difference purposes and functions in the industry, but with the formation of JCOST that is the Joint Council of Seaports Truckers, we have been able to come together in achieving a common goal. Before now the government taught we are unreasonable people and even the ordinary man on the street also taught that transporters are touts, but today we have members who are graduates. Right now we are concerned about the unity of the association in ensuring that things work better so that we can achieve a common goal.
There used to be Joint Association of Truck Owners in the 1990’swhich has failed. What makes you think that JCOST will survive?
That is why we are talking about unity among transporters, and I must say that if we are united; at least we can do anything but if some of us choose to stand alone, we cannot achieve anything because doing it alone will not work, but for now what we decide to do here is binding among each and everyone of us. What we decide here is what we will do at Tin Can Island port, same at the Apapa port and this is the reason why we form JCOST so that we can speak with one voice.
Is it true that there are some persons who are not fully committed to JCOST?
It is true, but we are using this medium to call on those people to be part of us because it is for their own good so that all of us can work together and I must say that if we are not together, we cannot do anything, we can’t achieve anything in the industry we find ourselves. Apart from the fact that some persons are not committed to JCOST 100%, we are still calling on some other truckers who are yet to support and join the JCOST quest in ensuring that things work out for good for everyone of us in the logistics chain and the maritime industry as well, therefore I am appealing to transporters and truck owners that are yet to join JCOST to do that for their own good.
Can you please throw some light on other associations which are yet to be part of JCOST?
There are some truck owners who parade themselves at Tin Can Island port as an unknown association but I think that they are not. Even at Apapa port now there are some groups who claimed to be under one umbrella but as far as we are concerned, they are not because they are not a registered association with the government of the land. The five associations that are operating in the two ports in Lagos under JCOST are genuinely registered with government. Association like Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners [NARTO] is all around the Federation, why we have dry and wet cargo section in all the seaports and roads of the country. Thus container carriers are the dry cargo section while the wet cargo carrier has to do with the petroleum tankers, thus many of the associations you see today are all known throughout the federation. For example Road Transport Employers’ Association of Nigeria [RTEAN] is known all over and there is nowhere in Nigeria you will not hear of RTEAN, so we have been like that for more than one year, thus other people who are yet to be part of the JCOST dream should key into it so that we can have a single voice in port operation.
How often do the groups create problems for the other registered association at the port?
No, not that they create any problem in the port but since they are not with us they don’t know what is happening in the sector because this people can thwart the effort of JCOST and I think it is not good for us all as truck owners. Last December when we held our annual general meeting at Tin Can Port many people were happy about what JCOST stands for and the stakeholders were all saying that this is what we want .For the group in question, I don’t know their names, but I know they are operating in the port and we all know that any union which is unregistered is illegal.
How old is JCOST?
JCOST is just a year plus and as we speak the government is aware of our existence, the Nigerian Ports Authority [NPA] and other government agencies are aware of our existence, in fact we visit NPA to suggest way out of some of the problems we are facing in the day- to- day operations at the port and all other sundry issues.
What will you say that you have achieved as the chairman of JCOST?
As far we are concerned, we have been able to do things right and to correct some of the government policies as they affect road operations in the state. For example the Lagos state traffic law that stipulates that truck should not ply the roads from 6am to 9pm, we championed the cause to speak with the State Governor through the commissioner for transport and at the end of the day, they listened to us and the resolution at that meeting was that they will look into it but our presentation at the meeting with the state government was to prove a point that we are professionals in the industry. They never thought about our suggestions which happened to be affirmative, so they said they will have a rethink on that policy by going back to the House of Assembly for amendment and since then nobody has been disturbing the trucks you see on Lagos roads. Before now, we are the people that suggested to NPA that they should provide us a holding bay, but they refused even when the special adviser to the president on project monitoring and evaluation came, he said the issue of holding bay will be a thing of the past, but nothing happened at the end of the day. With our effort we have been able to repair some of the roads leading to the ports in collaboration with the NPA and also before now the rate at which our drivers were attack has also reduced because of the improved roads within the ports, so all these I must say are improvement and achievement made by us.
But you are aware of the Minister of Works; Mike Onelomemen has given directive to the construction company to finish work on the holding bay for trucks in the next 16 weeks?
I don’t think it is possible to complete that project in less than 16 weeks because this same project has been on for over three and a half years with nothing to show for it, no result, how can they now tell us that they will complete it in less than 16 weeks. I think it’s a mere paper work on the part of the government, it is not possible. There was a time the same ministry told us that they are going to hasten the holding bay project, but nothing has been done since 2011.How can they complete that place within 16 weeks, it is not possible or let me say that stakeholders in the sector should be on the look out and see if it is going to be possible.
What is the position of JCOST in line with the directive of NPA on collection of N10, 000 on trucks?
What JCOST is saying is that NPA should overlook the collection of that money from truckers because they are not the ones giving us jobs. We have agents that give us containers and the terminals we carry these containers from do not belong to NPA. What I believe belong to NPA is the gate, so if NPA should say that we should come and register with N10, 000 because we want to pass their gate, what message are they sending to the terminal operators that store the containers .So we have been telling them to help us erase that money, as we speak discussion is still on-going.
How can you describe the activities of some government agencies at the gate?
The truth is that the government agencies at the gate are threat to us because they don’t have stake at the port and I must say that they are not helping us at all. They are just there to extort and collect money from us and we also gathered that they have been scrapped from the roads, but they are still there.
As chairman of JCOST, how far have you gone to ensure that they are no longer at the gate?
What they do now is to attach themselves with FRSC or LASTMA, but ironically you will never see them alone because whenever they are there alone, no truck drivers will listen to them and as we speak these are the major people that are disturbing the smooth flow of cargo out of the port, that is, the so-called LARPAC officials, so what we have done so far is to find out the actual time they will leave that place. Though we learnt that by the end of this month they might have left the place.
How do truck owners sensitize their drivers?
We do such occasionally in conjunction with the Lagos State government and the Nigerian Ports Authority [NPA] to educate our drivers about the latest development in the transportation industry and other traffic laws, otherwise our trucks would have been held by government officials .But it is important to enlighten the drivers because they are the ones who ply the roads on a daily basis.
Importers have been lamenting that 85% of trucks on the roads are rickety, what can you make from that?
If we are going to be sincere with ourselves, the importers do not know much about our trucks, rather is the agents that are only trying to give them that assertion that our trucks are bad. The agent cannot say that anymore, because our trucks are up to standard. If you say that five or seven years ago, we had rickety vehicles all over the place, I will totally agree with you but today it is not so, instead I will say 5% of our vehicles may not be too good and I am only been sincere with you about the figure. Since NPA started their enlightenment programme for truckers, things have changed for good.
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