Adeyinka Aroyewun president of the Committee of Maritime Transport Unions and Associations (COMTUA).
Story by Dili Utomi.
The umbrella body of truckers within the maritime sector of the Nigerian economy known as the Committee of Maritime Transport Unions and Associations also known as COMTUA has lashed out at what they call the exploitative and inefficient nature of the Nigerian Ports Authority/Trucks Transit Park limited partnership with the use of the traffic control software application simply known as the ETO platform.
The president of the association, Mr. Adeyinka Aroyewun who spoke exclusively to us traced the origin of the ETO application for the electronic call up system as introduced by the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) but ran on a contract basis by the Trucks Transit Parks TTP limited on a partnership basis and said that the application as introduced almost a year ago has failed to address the real problems for which it was introduced. He said that there has not been any meaningful change in the lives of transporters since. He noted that the traffic gridlock had been caused by bad road and subsequently, road construction, but quickly added that though the traffic jam has reduced considerably as the roads improve and construction moving at a faster pace now. Mr. Aroyewun said that the traffic jam is expected to completely ease out as the road construction is completed, but added that this is actually not the requirement of the ETO. He said that what are required of the ETO call up system and the operator, the TTP are seamless way of assessing the Ports by containers without stress, members being able to secure their business from touts, illegal activities and all manner of extortion, but that these, they have failed to achieve. He said that members cannot access the ports in and out within twenty four hours and this leads to goods of perishable nature getting spoilt thereby causing the attendant financial losses on all fronts and all because it takes weeks to access the ports. Again, he noted that they still get their trucks vandalised and these are issues that the ETO is supposed to address.
“We at COMTUA have thereby decided to employ an expert who has developed a traffic application for us and this will address all the issues that have been enumerated above. This application will allow us to access the ports within twenty four hours period and at a lesser cost. The app is going to create and secure jobs because there is going to be a market station embedded in it, the importers, exporters, manufactures and others are going to be able to access the app and it will help us to access the terminals seamlessly too.
It is going to cost us less to do business, the NPA promised us that it will cost us ten thousand naira through the ETO to access the ports, but we are currently paying twenty two thousand naira”.
“On this note, we are appealing to the management of the NPA that the COMTUA has developed its own app in other to organise their garages and their busines in a bid to run things smoothly and this application we have decided to start using at the end of February”.
The president said that this is why they are asking for the unbundling of the ETO, noting that if one has something that works better, he should use it and that is what they intend to do. He said that with this new app, there should be no traffic gridlock anymore.
On the probability of the NPA accepting this new app, Mr. Aroyewun said that the NPA has not declared that the purpose of the ETO application is for revenue generation purpose and so COMTUA expects them to critically look at the efficiency of the new app and then adopt it. Their intention and purpose have been cargo delivery within the port premises within the shortest possible time, but because of the gridlock and the lack of coordination in the part of truckers, the NPA saw itself dabbling into traffic issues, he noted that they are going to open up the new application for the world to see.
On the question of the sensitisation of everyone on the benefits of the new application, Mr. Aroyewun said that members are already being educated on the functions and efficiency of the new app and that that they are also meeting with the NPA to properly appeal to them to adopt the new call up application. He said that the introduction of the app stemmed from the all round inefficiency and all other issues that the ETO app has not been able to address.
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