Maritime Workers Threaten Fresh Strike At Seaports Over Access Road

Speaking over the weekend in Lagos when Alhaji Ahmed  Gambo, the Executive Director, Maritime Labour and Cabotage Service of the  Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) paid a working visit to the union, the President-General of the union,  Comrade Adewale Adeyanju lamented that government had promised  the union earlier in 2018 to repair the Ijora-Apapa and Oshodi-Apapa expressways before the end of second quarter but noted that nothing has been done to fix the failed portion of Tin Can Island access road.

Comrade Adeyanju lamented that the MoU signed by both parties in 2018 has expired thus the government failed to fulfil its own agreement.

Though, the union leader acknowledged efforts made by the federal government to reconstruct the Ijora-Apapa road, but bemoaned the dilapidated and abandoned state of the Oshodi-Apapa road.

While highlighting some of the challenges facing port users over the road, the MWUN boss called on the government to put in place measures to fix the deplorable condition of the failed road.

“The Vice President of this great country came to visit the port last year, he saw the situation of the port and a contract was awarded to the same man constructing the  Wharf Road linking Apapa port but we want to know what is happening to Tin Can Island port access road.

“What we are saying is that the government should put some palliative measures on ground which we know will reduce the gridlock on the road and that is the essence of saying we might be forced to renew our suspended ultimatum.

“We cannot access Tin Can Island Port,we cannot even access Mile 2; what we told the ministries at the meeting held last year was for them to upgrade the roads through palliative measures because Apapa was still under construction then but Apapa port access road is a bit motorable for now and nothing is done to Tin Can port access road.”

Adeyanju said the union would continue to engage the government on the port access roads, “We will continue to talk until something is done to fix Tin Can Island road , because we all signed a communiqué and this communiqué has elapsed.

“The Maritime Workers Union of Nigeria is not known to be loud when it comes to critical issues like this because  what we are saying affects the economic growth of the nation and turn around time for ships.

” We always believe in due process and we signed what we called a communiqué with the federal government last year and the way things are going right now is that we might be forced to renew that ultimatum,” he warned.

While commenting on the security agencies deployed to ease gridlock along the ports corridor, the union leader further frowned at the federal government taskforce on port decongestion over alleged extortion on truckers noting that the situation has led to high cost of transportation.

According to him, truck owners have increased haulage charges due to the alleged extortion and molestation of the taskforce at the Ijora bridge even as he noted that such actions have caused major setback to the growth of the maritime sector.

“We believe that the federal government set up the taskforce to make sure that the road is accessible by all the port users but from our information the place has been converted to a market place,” he alleged.