For Apapa residents, business owners, motorists whose daily income comes from commuting to and from the port city, it has been a long, tortuous and unnerving trek to where and what Apapa is at the moment.
Apapa had been in the news daily for the wrong reasons. The premier port city was literally under siege by trailers and tankers who occupied everywhere, blocking every exit and entry into the city. It was such that Apapa became a national issue, disrupting proceedings even at Federal Executive Council meetings.
Repeated public outcry and residents’ outrage over the impact of congestion and gridlock in the port city on their businesses and investments caused stakeholder interventions, leading to the setting up one taskforce or committee after another that hardly produced any results.
A presidential order was in August 2018 given by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo which never worked because, according to an Apapa resident who did not want to be named, the vice president was merely a toothless bull-dog that could only bark, but not bite.
Though not without initial hiccups, the new taskforce set up by President Muhammadu Buhari is gaining traction and has recorded appreciable results. The taskforce chaired by Vice President Osinbajo was established to restore law and order to the area within two weeks.
Members of the taskforce include Kayode Opeifa, former Commissioner of Transport in Lagos State, as the Executive Vice Chairman; a representative of the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC); the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA); and the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC).
This taskforce would work for two weeks which was extended by another two weeks and handover the management of the traffic to the Nigeria police, Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) and the Lagos State Traffic Management Agency (LASTMA).
Its terms of reference included the development of an efficient and effective management plan for the entire port area traffic, including the cargo, fuel distribution and business district traffic; enforcing the permanent removal of all stationary trucks on the highway, and the development of an effective manual truck call-up system, pending the introduction of the electronic truck call-up system. It also includes the implementation of a workable Empty Container Return and Export Container Truck Handling Policy, amongst others.
Even though it remains to be seen how much of these orders the taskforce has been able to carry out, one significant success it has recorded is the relative free and easy access to Apapa through Ijora and Eko Bridges. For those who saw it all, especially the residents, this is a considerable milestone.
The taskforce has been able to clear trucks on Eko Bridge particularly, and those still found, occasionally on Ijora Bridge maintain a single lane on the Apapa in-bound carriage way, leaving one lane for other road users.
Similarly, as at Friday July 26 afternoon, there was no single truck on the whole stretch of Ikorodu Road from Maryland to National Stadium in Surulere which used to be almost impassable and caused motorists to spend long hours to commute to either Apapa or the Lagos Island.
Though Bode Karunwi, the vice chairman of Apapa GRA Residents Association, is not comfortable with the one lane which the trucks still occupy on Ijora Bridge, business owners commend the taskforce for being able to sustain the free access to the port city in the last one month or more.
“We should commend them when they are getting it right. But at the same time, we must not fail to scream when they fail in their duty, because they have no reason to fail,” said a business own who did not want to be named.
The federal government is insisting that trucks should not be seen parked for days on Apapa roads on bridges. Opeifa assured in a telephone interview with BusinessDay that he and his team were determined to ensure that this mandate was achieved.
This has been helped significantly by the opening of the Lilypond Container Terminal in Ijora and the Tin Can Trailer Park which is now in use even as construction work continues. Many trucks now find their way into these terminals and from there, through a fledgling call up system, enter the ports.
So far, so good, but it not yet uhuru for both Apapa and the presidential taskforce. The Apapa Oshodi Expressway which is the major route to Apapa remains a ‘highway to hell’. Besides the rehabilitation work going on there, there is still heavy presence of trucks that are stationary on the expressway.
To an average observer, nothing has really changed as articulated trucks still litter the expressway such that right from Second Rainbow through Mile 2, trailers and tankers occupy the roads as usual, forcing other motorists to seek alternative routes to Apapa.
It is clear that the presidential ultimatum has failed to bring sanity to Apapa and its environs. The environment has been so degraded to a point where property value in the port city has dropped by more than 50 percent and will remain so for a long while.
Uche Chiejina, an estate manager in Apapa, told BusinesDay in an interview that even if Apapa returned to its former glory, it would take years for both interest and confidence to return to its property market.
“Many people and businesses that have relocated from here to the island will find it hard to make a U-turn. So, Apapa will be a hard sale for a long time to come,” Chiejina contended.
Vice-President Osinbajo is Head of the task force and during his recent visit to Apapa, he said it would take both medium and long term solutions to ultimately deliver to the users an efficient port environment for the economy and businesses to thrive. He hinged it all on infrastructure development.
But it is quite obvious that, the short term measure is not succeeding in which case hope now lies on the medium and long term measures. This is why concerned stakeholders are tasking the government to let the implementation of the medium and long term solutions begin given that orders and use of force cannot solve the congestion and gridlock in the port city.
While government dances around with its medium and long term measures, the next best thing to do in the immediate term is the establishment of more truck parks which, many believe, is a key solution to the problem of Apapa gridlock. Without parks, it is pretty difficult to clear the trucks off the road.
This has long been acknowledged by all government operatives. What is delaying immediate implementation continues to beat the imagination. Urgently, truck parks are needed not only in Lagos but also in Ogun State from where these rampaging trucks will find their way to the Lagos ports.
CHUKA UROKO
