Determined to restore sanity within the Apapa Port metropolis, the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) said it has perfected plans to introduce the electronic call-up system in the management of trucks going into the ports, come January 2021.
Hadiza Bala-Usman, managing director of the NPA, who disclosed this on Friday during an interview with Channels TV on Sunrise Daily, said there is a need to have a call-up system and truck parks at designated points to manage trucks inflow into the ports.
According to her, right now, trucks queue on the access roads without having business to do at the port, but with the call-up system, truck traffic into the port would be properly managed.
“We must have an electronic call-up where the trucks can only have access into the port through a designated point, which is the truck transit park. Right now, the truckers drive to the port location and they are there for days. In a lot of instances, they are there marketing that their trucks are a day to the port, come and give me cargo. So, we must have an electronic call-up where the truck parks are linked to the port location and the truck can only start going to the port if called upon,” Usman said.
She said the NPA would be using its Lilypond Terminal and Tin-Can Island Transit Park as entry points, where trucks would be given the final clearance into the port.
“To have sanity within Apapa, electronic call-up deployment is what we need to do. We have concluded that and in January, we are going to unveil it. We will be doing that while the Lagos State Government would be providing a larger trailer park, which will be the hub where trucks would stay and wait for clearance to go into the port. That would create a level of sanity where the whole area is not congested,” she further explained.
Usman however said that January is when the large trailer park that would accommodate about 1,000 trucks, which the Lagos State Government is providing, would be ready.
“They are going to use the Ahmed Bola Tinubu Trailer Park in Orile Iganmu to enable larger mob-up and from Orile Park, trucks would be called up to Lilypond or Tin-Can Island Trailer Parks to get the final clearance into the ports,” she said.
While acknowledging the existence of tank farms within the Apapa area, Usman noted that the call-up would be in two layers to accommodate trucks going into the seaport to pick cargo and trailers going into the tank farms to pick petroleum products.
She however assured that the introduction of an electronic call-up system would help to reduce, if not eradicate the issue of extortion allegedly being perpetrated by security operative presently in charge of passing trailers into the port.
Recall that traffic in and out of Apapa Port city in the last eight years has become quite challenging for businesses, residents, and motorists due to poor management of trucks and trailers going into the ports and tank farms within the metropolis.
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