Importers, clearing agents, and truck owners have cried out over the ever-worsening gridlock on the port access roads in Lagos, especially along with the Tin-Can Island Port Complex (TCIPC), alleging massive extortion.
They say in addition to the poor condition of the port access roads, extortion by security and traffic control officials remains the major cause of the unending gridlock along the Apapa-Oshodi Expressway.
Some truck drivers who spoke with BusinessDay on Wednesday expressed deep frustration, alleging that officials of Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) Security Department, police, and the Presidential Task Team deployed to manage traffic in the area demand huge sums of money as bribes from them before their trucks are granted access into the port.
A recent investigation by BusinessDay revealed well-organized racketeering going on in the port city involving truck drivers, security agencies, and government officials operating in the port city. At the Tin-Can Island Port Complex, Businessday found that security agencies extort between N70,000 and N200,000 per truck before such trucks are allowed into the port.
This has ensured unending gridlock in the port city and has negatively affected port operation as cargo delivery has been considerably slowed down, resulting in a sudden rise in haulage and shipping cost, thereby fuelling inflation in the country.
Sanni Bala, a truck owner and an executive member of the Association of Maritime Truck Owners (AMATO), said the security agents including members of the Task Team demand huge sums of money ranging from N70,000 to N200,000, depending on the ‘bargaining power’ of the truck driver, before allowing them into the port.
“The issue of unlawful extortion by NPA security officials, police and the Presidential Task Team along Apapa and Tin-Can Port road has become a daily occurrence and an institutionalised phenomenon that is taking a serious toll on the income of truck owners and exacerbating the plight of motorists on that axis,” Bala said.
“The issue of traffic on the access road is artificial and caused by human factor because, without the traffic, there is no how they can extort people, so they have to create the traffic by delaying truckers,” he said.
He said the extortion has left many truckers with nothing to take home and maintain their trucks, which, he said, is why there are rickety trucks on the roads.
Hadiza Bala Usman, NPA managing director, last weekend admitted that the port industry has been battling with the issue of extortion where truckers are forced to part with money before they could be allowed into the port.
“I’m aware of the issue where people are giving police and other officials on the route to the port money to enable them to have access into the port,” the NPA managing director said during a live interview on Channels TV’s Sunrise Daily.
“Aside, I’m not aware of any other incidents of corruption inside the port as relates to the clearance of cargo. That is while we are planning to introduce an electronic call-up system for trucks to eliminate human interference in the management of truck movement in the port area,” she said.
Kayode Opeifa, executive vice chairman of the Presidential Task Team, also said in a recent interview with BusinessDay that a lot of corrupt activities were happening on the port access roads, adding part of the reasons the team was not succeeding was because “corruption is fighting back”.
Remi Ogungbemi, chairman of AMATO, said what is happening at Tin-Can has become ‘the more you look, the less you see’.
“Business is still going on as usual and the Task Team has refused to leave because they are benefitting from the chaos. They have formed a cartel and if you are not in that group, they will not pass your truck to enter the port,” Ogungbemi said.
Ojo Akintoye, a clearing agent operating at the Tin-Can Island Port, alleged that there are more than four roadblocks between Tin-Can Island Port First and Second Gates set up by the Presidential Task Team, Police and NPA officials where each truck is expected to part with money before being allowed into the port.
“The extortion by those who claim to be controlling traffic on the road is the cause of the impediment we are experiencing daily along the port access road. As we speak, we pay between N1.1 million and N1.2 million per truck as against N100,000 to move our containers out of the port. The cheapest truck you can get to hire is N1 million. We have never experienced it this way before,” he lamented.
Kayode Farinto, national vice president, Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), called for the disbandment of the Presidential Task Team, which he said has become a money-making machine’.
According to him, clearing agents to lose an average of N300 million weekly to the illegal collection by NPA security officials, police, and members of the Presidential Task Team, adding that to enter the port, truck operators pay as high as N280,000 to security operatives on the road.
Farinto also lamented the absence of an electronic call-up system, saying that the manual call-up system being used by the NPA is fuelling corruption.
Recall that in February, the House of Representatives resolved to investigate the extortion of truck drivers in Apapa by security operatives. The resolution was made after lawmakers identified extortion by security officials as being a major factor responsible for the traffic challenges as operatives delayed the movement of truck drivers who refused to cooperate with them.
The House made the resolution consequent upon a motion titled “Urgent Need to Investigate the unwarranted Extortion of Truck Operators and other Port users by Law Enforcement Agents at Apapa Port” moved by Olusola Fatoba from Ekiti State, who said truck operators pay as high as N200,000 to N300,000 to gain access into the port.
He said the House was worried that law enforcement agents that are supposed to maintain law and order at the port had formed a ‘cartel’ in cahoots with unscrupulous port officials, extorting money ranging from N200,000 to N300,000 per truck to gain entrance into the port to load or offload containers.
Fatoba said the ‘ugly trend’ had been going on unabated for years, but became worse after naval officers were removed from the operations, as the sum of N60,000 to N100,000 was extorted when the naval officers were in charge of the operation.
He further said the House was also worried that as a result of the activities of law enforcement agents in Apapa, ‘a truck may spend up to two months before gaining access into the terminal which is causing a lot of hardships and a huge increase in the cost of doing business which may inevitably lead to unrest and breakdown of law and order by frustrated and oppressed truck operators’.
