NURTW, cycle operators want Lagos revise law

The Lagos State Chapter of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) on Wednesday called on the Lagos State Government to create more parks and garages for its members.

Mr Tajudeen Agbede, the chairman of the NURTW, Lagos State chapter, said at a press briefing in Lagos that the government should help build more parks and garages to reduce the activities of touts.

“We appeal to the state government to create more parks and garages for our members to operate; we are constrained and forced to use some Lagos roads to serve the people because the government did not provide enough needed motor parks.

“We do not want our members to be jobless because an idle hand is the devil’s workshop,” Agbede said.

He said that the NURTW members were law abiding people who paid their taxes promptly for the progress of the state.

Agbede also said that the union was planning to send its members to the Lagos State Drivers Institute to upgrade their knowledge in driving and road usage.

“We pay our taxes promptly and we are planning to attend the Lagos State Drivers Institute, which has an advantage for us in sanitising our union to make us more responsible.

“As partners in progress, we are prepared to comply with all the directives of the government and plead that the government should equally take our plight into consideration,” Agbede said.

“We also appeal passionately to the state government to allow us collect membership dues from our member drivers at parks and garages,” Agbede, who hinged the demand on the fact that most of their members were daily paid drivers, said.

The NURTW chairman disclosed that the union had directed Motorcycle Operators Association of Lagos State (MOALS) and tricycles operators affiliated to the union to set up task forces to control , sanitise and manage their operations with immediate effect

He also appealed to the state government to revisit the issue of restriction of commercial motorcycle /tricycle operations from close to 500 roads in the state, as it could lead to unemployment and affect numerous families..

Agbede said that they met with the Lagos State Commissioner for Transportation , Mr Kayode Opeifa, on Monday, to dialogue on how to meet the demands of the new traffic law in the state.

The state chairman of the MOALS, Mr Tijani Perkis, in his own speech, appealed to the state government to have a second look at the new traffic law which restricted the motorcyclists from plying over 496 roads in Local Government and Local Government Development Areas (LCDA) of the State.

He said that the restriction would amount to 80 percent ban on their operations in all the local governments and LCDAs in the state.

Perkis urged Governor Babatunde Fashola to keep to the promise he made to them at the March 2011 town hall meeting that he would meet with the union of the riders quarterly on all laws concerning them.

“We are appealing to the state government to stop enforcement and give us more time to educate our numerous members about the new traffic law, while we dialogue with the government to temper justice with mercy,’’ he said.

Fashola had on Thursday endorsed the new traffic law, while on Friday, the Commissioner for Transportation shed more light on it.