As part of its efforts at easing the notorious gridlock in Apapa, Nigeria’s busiest port city, the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) says it is perfecting plans to put Lilypond Terminal and Tin-Can Trailer Park into use as temporary parking spaces for trucks coming to both Apapa and Tin-Can Island Ports.
The Lilypond Terminal, which will be made available to service trucks carrying containers that have business to do in Apapa port, will be open for business on Thursday, May 2, 2019 while the trailer park, billed to service trucks going to Tin-Can Island Port, will be opened on Friday, May 3, 2019.
The Senate Committed on Works had, at an expanded stakeholders meeting last weekend, committed to ending the congestion and gridlock in and around Apapa, raising expectations among the traumatised and disillusioned residents, business owners and port users within the port community that a breath of fresh air was underway.
Apapa, for some time now, especially in the last three years, has been an occupied territory with trailers and tankers taking over the entire community, causing congestion, occupying roads and bridges, denying residents access to their homes, killing businesses, degrading the environment, reducing the value of both residential and commercial properties, and impoverishing their owners.
Worried about this situation which it has described as a “national embarrassment”, the Senate Committee said it was determined and committed to ending the gridlock which has been taking toll not only on Apapa and Lagos, but also on the fragile national economy.
“What is happening in Apapa is a national embarrassment; we have received several reports on how residents of Apapa sleep outside because they cannot access their homes; many businesses have been forced to either relocate from Apapa or close down completely. We cannot afford to allow that to continue to happen,” Kabiru Gaya, the committee chairman, said at an expanded stakeholders’ meeting in Lagos last weekend.
“We are here as part of our oversight functions and we are determined to end the Apapa gridlock with the cooperation of all the relevant stakeholders,” Gaya added, ordering the Federal Ministry of Works to ensure quick completion of the trailer park being constructed along the Apapa-Oshodi Expressway.
The trailer park, on which construction work started about eight years ago, is aimed to decongest the expressway by serving as transit park for trucks making their way into the ports. On completion, the park is expected to take away from the expressway about 400 trailers.
NPA has promised that when the trailer park is opened, it would deploy its towing vans, with the assistance of Lagos State Transport Management Authority (LASTMA) officials, to tow any defaulting truck found parking on the roads and bridges leading to the ports in Lagos.
The NPA, which spoke at a sensitisation workshop on traffic management/use of Lilypond Terminals and the trailer park in Lagos on Monday, promised truckers that the parks would be used free, in the interim, saying that a fine of N20,000 would be imposed on any defaulting truck.
Sekonte Davis, executive director, marine and operations of the NPA, said the opening of the truck parks would enable the NPA to implement an integrated call-up system to deal with the emergency traffic situation, disclosing that the new measures would be implemented in collaboration with the shipping companies’ holding-bays just as the new call-up system would only be generated and managed by the NPA.
“Trucks without empty containers would not be allowed into the port areas. With the new measures, trucks that want to pick laden containers must first go to the shipping companies’ holding-bays to pick empty container meant for the terminal the truck is going to pick laden container,” he said.
Davis, who said that the NPA would prioritise export of containers of perishable goods that have full documentation, added that such containers would be allowed into the parks and would be given maximum staying period of 48 hours.
He assured truckers that military and other uniformed personnel would soon be disbanded from mounting checkpoints on the roads while a new taskforce would be set up by the NPA to enforce the new measures.
Ihenacho Ebubeogu, general manager, security of the NPA, hinted that traffic in and out of Apapa would be managed by LASTMA, police, FRSC and the NPA security officials.
“Henceforth, the NPA forbids trucks and trailers parking on the bridges to Apapa. And the new trailer parks will not be opened to trucks that are not in the call-up system because the parks will serve as transit parks and not permanent parking spaces,” he said.
Remi Ogungbemi, chairman, Association of Maritime Truck Owners (AMATO), commended the NPA for the new measures aimed at managing traffic, describing them as workable solutions to Apapa gridlock.
He assured the NPA of the commitment and compliance of members of his association to the workability of the new measures.
CHUKA UROKO & AMAKA ANAGOR-EWUZIE
