Worried by the incessant accidents caused by recklessness of drivers of container-carrying trucks and tanker trailers, analysts have called for the establishment of truck movement regulation as well as reform process that would reduce the number of trucks on Nigerian roads.
According to them, Nigeria also needs to reduce the number of tankers evacuating highly inflammable petroleum products, which on many occasions, upturn on the highway, resulting in expulsion and death of many innocent citizens.
BDSUNDAY search has shown that for Nigeria to achieve this there is need to develop a modern rail system that would take a large number of trucks (about 120 trucks at once) off Nigerian roads. This is because the use of modern rail system has been identified as the safest and cheapest way to move liquid and dry cargoes in and out of the port especially in developed countries of the world.
In France for instance, the railway system was incorporated into the port such that as the vessel berths in the seaside, containers would be discharged directly from the ship into the rail without having to deal with trucks littering the roads around the port and causing accidents. This has helped in reducing safety issues, death of citizens and pressure on the roads.
Presently, about 40,000 trucks flood Nigeria roads and cities, but, only about 20-25,000 trucks are required in the real sense for haulage business. This explains why pundits argue that some trucks do only one trip in a week, while some do not even do any trip in two weeks.
A recent research conducted in Lagos Port and funded by the Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC) revealed that about 5,000 trucks come to Apapa Port, the nation’s premier port, on daily basis but only about 1,500 trucks are needed to do daily transaction in Apapa port.
Automatically, the other 3,500 moving within the Apapa port environment end up constituting nuisance to other port and road users due to lack of business.
Further investigation by BDSUNDAY shows that Nigeria’s fleet check is currently poor with drivers not well documented and licensed by licensing authorities. Many of them learn driving like ‘apprenticeship’ without undergoing driving training. This explains why some drivers tend to disappear without trace, whenever they are involved in accident on the road.
Alarmingly, about 90 percent of passenger and cargoes movements in Nigeria are doing by road due to over dependence on road and underdevelopment of water and rail transportation.
To find a lasting solution to the menace of trucks and trailers on Nigerian roads, Nigeria needs to look beyond roads by seeking alternative means of transport including use of modern rail and waterways.
Hadiza Bala Usman, managing director of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), who stated that Nigeria needs to consider using the rail system to move containers, said that Ministry of Transportation needs to provide clear timeline and percentages of cargoes that should be moved through the different nooses of transportation including inland waters, road and rail line.
According to her, “To reduce the number of trucks and trailers on Nigerian roads, we need to determine the percentages of cargoes from our ports to be apportioned to a particular transportation model because all cargoes cannot be moved by road. For instance, we need to determine that 30 percent of our cargoes must go through the rail and commit about three to four years timeline in order to deploy the necessary resources to building the needed infrastructure.”
Statistics have shown that Nigeria has about 120 million metric tonnes of cargo available to be moved annually. Sadly, the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC), the agency in charge of developing the rail system as well as its operations, has failed to tap into the opportunities inherent in the movement of this volume of cargo across the country.
Pundits believe that the over-reliance on road using trucks has not only led to the dilapidated state of roads and increased rate of accidents on Nigerian roads, but has also increased cost for businesses especially exporters and importers, who presently pay dearly to move their cargoes.
Effective use of railway in movement of ‘high risk’ cargoes notwithstanding, Nigeria also needs to reform truck operations especially within the nation’s seaports by removing rickety and obsolete trucks that indiscriminately upturn and obstruct free flow of traffic on Nigerian roads while on transit.
To reform truck operation in Nigeria, Hassan Bello, executive secretary of the Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC) told BDSUNDAY that there is need to institute a regulation and reform that would ensure that only registered truck companies with minimum of six fleets will be allowed to operate in Nigerian seaports.
Cargo carriage, according to him, is a very serious business that requires healthy trucks, thus, the need for truck operators to become more qualified in doing business in Nigeria.
“For truck to qualify to operate in the port, the company must in addition to having a minimum of six fleets, have healthy trucks that can move on the road with limited or no hazards on the cargo on transit and other road users,” Bello said.
According to him, container truck and tanker trailer operators are citizens handling their individual businesses. “Therefore, they need to consider their business concern against the danger on the general public by ensuring quality maintenance of their fleets and controlling an acceptable speed limit while on transit.
For Emeka Akabuogu, a maritime lawyer, it is ideal for containers to be taken to designated inland container depots (ICDs) using the railway.
“Many containers need to be evacuated from the port by rail. We already have inland port and we need bulk movement of containers by rail for cost effectiveness, safety of lives and reduction of health hazards caused by articulated vehicles on Nigerian roads,” he said.
The Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC), he said, needs to ensure the standard and quality of trucks that move on Nigerian roads. While emphasising on the need for standards, Akabuogu said, trucks and trailers operating in Nigerian haulage sector needs to have specific standards they must meet to be able to access the port.
“If this is on ground, truck operators will start renewing their fleet to protect the lives of innocent Nigerians,” he stated.
He further suggested the need for a call-up system to ensure that only the trucks that are engaged to lift containers and other cargoes are allowed to access the roads to the ports in Apapa.
Just like trailer parks in Ijora and Tin-Can Second Gate, it has also become necessary that Nigeria establishes a functional trailer park around Apapa-Oshodi expressway to enable trailers going to the tank farms, move seamlessly on schedule without having thousands of them queue on the road.
AMAKA ANAGOR-EWUZIE
