Prince Adeyinka Aroyewun, the National President of COMTUA has queried “What other indication does anyone need to verify my claims of over three years; about the illegality, failure, fraudulent and criminalities attached to the call-up system and its revenue at the ports.”
In a statement made available to Business Hilights on Thursday in Lagos, he averred that “At the inception of the policy, it was propagated that the entire process shall not take a truck more than few hours to complete and arrive inside terminal, at a cost of Ten Thousand Naira (#10,000) only.
“The promoters mentioned that it was aimed at eliminating human interference, extortion, priority conferred and some trucks and individuals, illegal impoundment of trucks by law enforcement agencies, provision of jobs for trucks and so on. All truckers including myself and my association bought into it and we gave our maximum cooperation.
“The leadership of COMTUA under Mr Olaleye Thompson did not spend so much time to convince members using an incentive of Five hundred Naira (#500) on each of the said Ten thousand Naira (#10,000) charges per trip to every union and association. In the first week of the commencement of the policy, “All promise cancelled” Trucks painted in Army colour started enjoying priority on the premise that it was carrying military items. The number of these trucks increases by the day even when our petition to the Chief of defence staff was responded to that all those trucks does not belong to the Army and we also established that the trucks are owned by individuals to operate non military but private businesses of return of empty containers and exports.
“One is confused, especially when these trucks are driven by men in Army uniform.
The roads leading to port are flooded with enforcement personnel to check and verify call-up. As if that was not enough, several other business owners begin to enjoy priority in the name of evacuation, port access and all sort of nomenclature. To add salt on truckers’ injuries, the fee begins to rise from the agreed Ten thousand Naira (#10,000) to as much as Thirty thousand Naira (#30000) and all other charges including matching of containers, transaction charges etc.
“We did not hesitate to challenge NPA/TTP but all sort of tactics were employed to silent every opposition. Selective stakeholders’ meetings, compromising members by recruiting all sort of individuals to attack oppositions to their fraudulent revenue collections. Of the five (5) years TTP contract with NPA, four years gone but we are still discussing congestion.
On what legality is the collected revenue based, who is suppose to be the payer, what law empowers anyone to deny a truck access to the port when It has a business to do there? By whom is Call up for trucks to Apapa now sells at Two hundred thousand Naira (#200,000,) and point by point settlement to the port. All these we asked but the recklessness of the management of NPA will not allow them review their grounds.
“Concerns of the clearing agents and importers are germane; they are coming a bit late. It’s better late than never, COMTUA President added.
