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NPA wants Lagos, Ogun to provide trailer parks to ease port city gridlock

Hadiza Bala Usman, Managing Director of NPA
The Nigerian
Ports Authority (NPA) has requested the governments of Lagos and Ogun states to
provide trailer parks that the Authority would license for operations to
ease the gridlock causing difficulties for movement of cargoes in and out of
the ports.

Managing
Director of the NPA, Hadiza Bala Usman made this known on Friday while briefing
newsmen on the forth-coming International Association of Ports and Harbours’s Africa
Regional Conference on ports and hinterland connectivity.  
The managing
director said that she turned her request for trailer parks to the governments
of the states because they have the ownership of land and would easily address
the need.
She noted
that although the NPA had advertised its willingness to license trailer parks
when such owners come forward, there had not been any corresponding result to
that effect.
“We have
advertised seeking for people with trailer parks so that we can license. We
received about four expressions of interest, but they didn’t show ownership of
any trailer park.

“I have met with
Lagos State and written to the governor that we want to license trailer park.

“I have also written
to Ogun State governor and I am to meet with him too, to license trailer park
even in Ogun, because the state government is the custodial of land.

“NPA does not
have land and can’t build a trailer park. It is outside our purview, but we are
seeking on how we can collaborate with the state government and local
government on connecting those trailer parks.”

Frowning at the
method of operations by  truck drivers,
Bala Usman said sometimes truck drivers just came out to occupy the port access
roads queuing up to scout for jobs until they got one, therefore causing
unnecessary gridlock.

She said: “Sometimes,
a significant number of the trucks you see on the road are actually there doing
anything. They are just at the ports to look for business, and that is
irresponsible.

“So, if we have
the licensed trailer park, only trucks coming from the trailer park will be
allowed access into the port. If you are looking for business you go to the
trailer park and stay there. If somebody wants a truck he can go to the trailer
park and get you there.”

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