COMTUA Partners VIO To Fizzle Out Rickety Trucks From Port Operations

Group under the aegis of Council of Maritime Transport Unions and Associations (COMTUA), has disclosed plans to engage law enforcement agencies to fizzle out rickety trucks from seaports operation in Lagos State

 

The truckers, have reaffirmed it commitment ensure standardisation of heavy-duty trucks plying the port environment.

President of the Council of Mr. Leye Thompson made this known in a chat with our correspondent in Lagos on Wednesday.

Thompson, who is the Managing Director, Thom Lee Nigeria Limited, a haulage outfit, was appointed as president of the Council, recently.

The move, according to him, is to remove rickety trucks from haulage operations in Nigeria.

“Ordinarily, we are not suppose to see rickety trucks on the port access roads again, I personally discussed with the director VIO ,that we need their presence in the port environment and he has assured me that they will be coming to carry out a survey by next week”; he added.

Thompson assured drivers and their assistants of trainings as part of efforts to embrace digitisation in haulage business in the port.

The COMTUA boss added that plans were also in the pipeline to engage the Federal Roads Safety Corps (FRSC) and the Lagos State Government to educate, enlighten and sensitize drivers in preparation for the future of the digital haulage business.

“Electronic call up system is the best because we won’t have human contact but again some of our drivers and managers are not enlightened to such level whereby they can operate the digital process.

“But if that is the majority decision that we need to upgrade the system then there should be some level of training for them and that is what this administration is planning to do for them.

“We need to work on the psyche of our members to develop from analog to digital system.

“We COMTUA intended to partner Lagos State Government to train our members and FRSC is also in the wings to sensitize our members .

The CEO of Thom Lee Nigeria Limited reiterated that the psyche of truckers must change following the modern trends in haulage operations in line with modern best practices.

According to him, the transporters group would continue to engage government and private sector players to ease free flow of vehicles to assist in trade facilitation, pointing out that export-bound cargoes along the port corridors must be given topmost priority to access the Seaports in Lagos.

On the performance of the Presidential Taskforce on Apapa Traffic, Thompson thumbed up its performance, saying there is more free flow of traffic in the corridor than what used to obtain.

“The presidential task team are doing a wonderful job along port corridors.”

 

By Roland Ekama