By Olumide Adeyinka
The presidential task team on the clearing of Apapa port gridlock have been given two more weeks to complete its task, Sunrise News has learnt.
The extension followed a full briefing received by the presidency on the activity of the team, which was established following the May 23 directive of President Muhammadu Buhari that trucks drivers should clear off the Apapa port and all access roads and bridges within 72 hours.
The committee had met with the Vice President at his State House office on June 12.
Speaking with our correspondent on Friday evening, the Vice Chairman of the team, Comrade Kayode Opeifa said the presidency, happy with the team’s capacity to restore law and order in Apapa has “graciously agreed to extend its deadline by another two weeks.”
According to him, the team have restored order on the Western Avenue axis access to the port, which concerted effort is ongoing to sanitise the operations of trailers and trucks on the Apapa-Oshodi access and to control activities especially at Coconut area to Tincan.
He said: “we have concentrating all our attention right now on controlling truck movement on the major truck route into the port, which is the Apapa-Oshodi expressway and work on that axis has been slowed down as a result of the bad state of the road network between Mile 2 and Apapa.”
He added that the contractor handling the rehabilitation of the Apapa Oshodi expressway has been able to access the port and palliative work has since started on the road.
With the palliation it will then be possible to better manage the traffic flow away from the bad portion and allow the contractor to resume work while also affording the truckers to manage the road and access the port.
Opeifa said the committee’s activities have been slowed down in the past two days by the rain, which has further worsened the state of road and made access more challenging.
He however saluted men of the police force led by the police Commissioner Hakeem Odumosu and the Commander MOPOL 40 Bayonle Sulaiman who have continued to work assiduously to ensure that the situation at the Coconut-Tincan road is brought under control.
The disclosed that the security pperativez have also been able to crush the syndicate who have turned the Tincan road into a goldmine collecting between N65,000 and N120,000 from 20 tons or 40 tons truck drivers respectively daily, just to gain access to the port road.
He assured Mr President that the team would be able to sanitise the access roads and put in place a call-up system coordinated by the Nigerian Ports Authority, to manage the traffic on the roads.
Opeifa equally appealed to terminal operators to assist the team in achieving results on the presidential mandate.
According to him, the team have received a number of protests from truckers against some terminal operators, who they alleged are deliberately sabotaging government’s effort to sanitise the Apapa road.
He said the team will not hesitate to bring the force of the government down on any operator found sabotaging efforts to bring sanity to Apapa ports.
He said the Muhammadu Buhari administration is committed to strengthening the nation’s economy and would stop at nothing to ensure that its executive order on the ease of doing business either at the ports and elsewhere is fully complied with.
Speaking on aspects of the team’s successes, Opeifa said it is now illegal for any trucks to go straight into the ports, either to return empties or pick new consignments.
According to him, part of the strategies which has been put in place to manage traffic at the port access roads is to convert the Lillypond Truck Terminal into a marshalling yard, from where trucks would be called into the ports by the terminal operators.
He said about 54 private trucks park have been identified where trucks can be parked pending the time they would be called to transit to Lillypond from where they would thereafter be called to proceed into the port.
He disclosed that these 54 private parks would soon be complemented by other parks being spearheaded by the Federal and state governments around Apapa.
According to him, three such parks, the TincanTrailer Park, another one being constructed by the Federal Ministry of Works and a third being proposed by the Lagos State government on Park B,C and D would further bring succour to truckers and finally erase the congestion being experienced at Apapa.
He therefore assured all residents and other Nigerians working around Apapa that the team is committed to bringing them relief and ensure that their trauma on the road and the impact of the truck operators are brought to an end.
He further assured that the team will ensure that the Apapa gridlock will not resurface again as all parties whose activities birth these working together to bring a lasting solution and to evolve appropriate policies to sustain a congestion free Apapa port and its access roads and on the bridges.
He said the team would not rest on its oars until law and order is finally restored at Apapa, as according to him, “that is the dream of the government.”