By Daniel Tyokua
The Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) has resumed its fight against erring commercial motorcyclists operating in restricted areas.
A combined team of officials drawn from military and para – military, FCT Directorate of Road Traffic Services (DRTS) and Abuja Environmental Protection Board raided Lokogoma roundabout, Piwoyi and other areas and arrested some okada riders that flouted the restriction order.
During the exercise, there was watertight security cover from the Police, Military and Paramilitary operatives not only confiscated many motorcycles, but also apprehended some recalcitrant operators, for allegedly contravening traffic rules as well as constituting environmental nuisances.
Other areas raided include Lokogoma roundabout, Piwoyi Junction near Shoprite mall, Lugbe FHA, and popular Lugbe Police signboard, along Airport Road, all in AMAC, where some riders are in the habit of attacking enforcement officers.
The raid, which was aimed at riding the city of increasing nuisances from the operations of commercial motorcyclists within the areas visited and other prohibited areas of the nation’s capital city, came barely one month, that one of the newly recruited male officers of the DRTS “between 25-30 years old” was brutally killed, when the okada operators attacked them while transversing the area, after a raid at Area 3.
Flagging off the exercise, in Durumi II, Secretary, FCT Transportation Secretariat, Abdullahi Adamu Candido, said it is going to be a continuous initiative, untill the prohibited motorcycles are completely flushed out, so that the city can become what all will be proud of.
Candido reiterated that any lawless citizen wishing to test the will of the government will not be tolerated.
“The FCTA will now be more determined than before, because of the security and maintenance of the plan of the city, so we can have good city that all Nigerians will be proud of.
“This is a developing city that is guided by planned policies of government, which we must not allow any lawless person to set backward.
“On behalf of the FCTA , let me re-echo that we will never watch people, who do not have respect for the law to overhaul the good citizens who want things going in a decent manner”, he stressed
Similarly, Senior Special Assistant on Monitoring, Inspection and Enforcement to FCT Minister, Ikharo Attah, who led raid, noted that the issue of Okada is more of a security threat than commercial or transportation problem in the Territory.
Attah recalled that just three weeks ago around the same area, one of its personnel from DRTS was stabbed and killed by the Okada riders, adding that “one of us was badly injured in the neck, but thank God he is stable while recuperating”.
According to him, “Durumi that is very notorious for their activities is prohibited for them to be operating here, and the Minister is extremely grateful to all agencies involved in the exercise.
“We are assuring that we keep putting in our best to ensure that this city is very safe”.
The DRTS Director, Abdullateef Bello disclosed that the confiscation and crushing of the about two hundred motorcycles were to serve as serious deterrence to others especially the recalcitrant operators.
He explained that the exercise was in line with policy that prohibited their operation within the nation’s capital city since 2006.
Other top officials who witnessed the flagging off of the exercise include Heads and representatives of the various security and paramilitary agencies operating in the FCT.
