Each passing day presents frustrating scenarios showing why it is becoming, increasingly, difficult to find solution to the Apapa congestion and gridlock which, in recent time, have assumed embarrassing and disturbing dimensions, despite a subsisting presidential order to clear them without delay.
Apapa gridlock has become intractable, defying short term solutions as reflected in presidential orders and several stakeholders meetings, committees and taskforce comprising army, navy, police officers, residents, business owners, and maritime trade unions.
BusinessDay findings show that besides poor state of infrastructure in and around Apapa, logistics problems as well as human factor manifesting in corruption and compromises are also critical factors that contribute significantly to what Apapa was yesterday and what it is today.
By reason of its statutory functions, though it is one of the 20 local government areas in Lagos State, Apapa is Federal Government’s property from where it rakes hundreds of billions of naira revenue from operations of its agencies at the two seaports in the area.
The Federal Government has very strong presence at the two ports with its agencies collecting money for it. The Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) alone, in 2018, collected a total sum of N1.2 trillion in revenue for the government. It also impounded a total of 5,235 seizures with duty paid value (DPV) of N61.5 billion following its anti-smuggling operations. The 2018 revenue was N164.8 billion more than that of 2017, which was N1.037 trillion.
The NCS, in the last three years, has generated about N3.1 trillion in revenue and much of these revenues come from its activities at the Apapa ports, yet government does not have the political will to invest even 10 percent of this revenue into making Apapa what it is supposed to be as a port city.
Borini Prono, the contractor handling the Tin Can Trailer Park has been on that project for almost 10 years, citing lack of the needed funding from the federal government. The non-completion of that park, which can accommodate 400 trucks, is a major factor contributing to the gridlock.
Added to this lack of political will to invest in Apapa are the vested interests which come in various forms, making solution to Apapa very difficult, if not impossible. Owners of tank farms scattered all over the port city as well as haulage operators would do everything humanly possible to keep Apapa perpetually down to their selfish advantage.
When on May 22, 2019 the presidency gave out a 72-hour ultimatum for trucks to vacate all roads and bridges leading to Apapa and followed it up with the setting up a presidential taskforce to enforce the ultimatum, Apapa residents, business owners and their friends thought the end had come for gridlock.
They were mistaken because the situation has worsened ever since. The police and Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA) who are members of the taskforce charged with enforcing the presidential order, are not only overwhelmed by the enormity of work to do, but also handicapped.
“We would rather have a voluntary compliance of the truck operators with the presidential directive to vacate the bridges and roads around Apapa because of the logistical challenges associated with forceful towing of the trucks,” a LASTMA official, who craved anonymity, told BusinessDay on phone Monday.
One of such challenges, the official explained, has to do with availability of towing vehicles for such massive operations, disclosing that the authority did not have, in its operations, the number of towing vehicles required for such large scale operations and, therefore, relied on private towing van operators, who demand payment upfront.
Asides the upfront payment, the private towing van operators are also unreliable as they have, many times, refused to show up at the right time, thereby, frustrating the operations.
“The trucks are tightly parked close to one another. This makes it difficult to drive in the towing vans in between to tow the trucks,” said the official, who added that many LASTMA operatives had been wounded by the truck drivers, whom he alleged have dangerous weapons, including knives with them.
The official also lamented the lack of inadequate parking spaces for towed trucks. “Truth is that LASTMA does not have enough space to keep the trucks if we were to tow all the ones still lying on the roads and bridges,” he said.
Another reason for the persisting gridlock, according to truck owners, is federal government’s perceived double standards in the application of the new Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), developed to guide traffic management in Apapa.
This, the truck owners alleged, was why the new taskforce is struggling with traffic management, making motorists and port users continue to surfer long travel time.
Remi Ogungbemi, chairman of the Association of Maritime Truck Owners (AMARTO), who described the SOP as selective, said it was bound to fail from inception. “The Federal Government’s Standard Operating Procedure directed the new taskforce to give priority to and allow free access to trucks belonging to companies such as BUA, Flour Mills of Nigeria, Honeywell, Dangote as well as sided trucks, reefers, silos, fish trucks and flatbed trucks.
“The directive should have been for all trucks to vacate the roads to Apapa in order to enable the traffic management officials to control the traffic rather than treating some categories of trucks differently from others,” he said.
Ogungbemi pointed that the same exemption and priority consideration is being given to all trucks carrying export containers, adding that the taskforce and the presidential committee that set up the taskforce, need to review the Standard Operating Procedure in collaboration with the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) to come up with a workable procedure.
“The selective nature of the directive is the cause of the problem. The directive should not be selective. It should have been total by letting all trucks to leave the roads. This is why we are not getting it right,” he added.
CHUKA UROKO, JOSHUA BASSEY & AMAKA ANAGOR-EWUZIE
