.Commends LASG, NPA for quick intervention in averting truckers’ planned strike
.Identifies hike in petroleum pump price as catalyst to economic hardship in Nigeria
ZAINAB JUNAID
The Maritime Journalists’ Association of Nigeria (MAJAN) has commended the Lagos State Government and Nigerian Port Authority (NPA) for the quick intervention in averting truckers’ planned strike as a result of extortion and harassment by hoodlums along Port Corridor.
In a communique issued at the end of its monthly meeting held on Thursday, 12 September 2024, at its Secretariat in Apapa, Lagos, the association addressed issues affecting the State of the Nation and suggested that Lagos State Government and Nigeria Port Authority should intensify effort in tackling the extortion by mounting security surveillance at necessary points along Tin Can-Mile 2 Port Corridor to ward off further incursion of hoodlums.
It stressed that Security agencies/personnel that will mount the surveillance points should not turn the place to another checkpoint of extortion as this will be counter productive.
Similarly, the association also identified hike in petroleum pump price as being responsible for the economic hardship currently experienced by Nigerians, and consequently suggested that government should deploy measures to cushion the effect of this hardship.
“Government should give financial subvention, provide farming materials to farmers, subsidize transport fare, among others. Items such as fertilizer, seedlings, herbicides, water pumping machines and hoses, animal feeds, subsidized kids and calves should be made available to farmers as an encouragement to boost productivity,” the association said.
In a related development, MAJAN wondered where the money removed from subsidy was ploughed, and demanded government to tell Nigerians how the money have been utilized.
While urging the government to protect the consumers from exploitation,the group posited that Nigerians should hold the State Governors and the local governments accountable For the current hardship in the land.
It emphasized that the monthly allocation given to these tiers of governments are not properly utilised, and this has left the citizens impoverished.
MAJAN also advised government to stop ad-hoc solutions to the nations economic problems, and come up with deliberate economic plans to better the future of the country.
They also urged the government to revamp the refineries and get them working. “If the refineries in the country are operational, the nation would not be having the current issues it is facing now. The senate and the government need to tell Nigerians why the refineries have refused to function,even as government continues to pay salaries and allowances of the workers in those refineries,” MAJAN said.
While noting the high rate of unemployment in the country, the group urged government to create an enabling environment for job creation,adding that government should make our economy a productive one and not a consumer economy, as it is presently.
Addressing the now rampant issue of Danger on the wheel, popularly called “One Chance,” “highway robberies”, where unsuspecting commuters are lured into vehicle stuffed with armed robbers, the group enjoined the State Government to beef up security on high ways.
It also urged the Police to conduct checks on commercial vehicles, periodically, as these buses are mostly used by these dare devil robbers to perpetrate their nefarious activity.
