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‘How to curb traffic, lawlessness on Lagos roads’

By Benjamin Alade
02 November 2018   |   4:20 am
Mixed reactions have continued to trail Operation Restore Sanity/Velvet recently launched by the Lagos State Police Command.

AFP PHOTO / PIUS UTOMI EKPEI

Mixed reactions have continued to trail Operation Restore Sanity/Velvet recently launched by the Lagos State Police Command.

The Command had launched a joint operation with other sister agencies to tackle the upsurge in traffic gridlock on roads across the state caused by lawlessness on the part of some motorists, among other factors.

Indeed, the initiative has left many motorists complaining on the exercise, arguing that it was unnecessary, as it created traffic congestion in some parts of the state.

Many commercial drivers have also stayed away from the roads as a result of the police operation, leaving many commuters stranded at bus stops before the exercise was suspended late Tuesday.

However, motoring experts argued that motorist and car owners need more time and sensitisaton to regularise their vehicle documents before using the roads.

Principal partner of an automobile resource company, Media Advocate Limited, Manny Philipson, said never in history of traffic management worldwide had the use of force to pattern or lessen vehicular movement yielded any desired result. It wouldn’t be out of place to infer therefore, that the proposed joint operation code named “Operation Velvet,” aimed at restoring sanity on Lagos roads may have failed from the start.

He said the approach has luckily started to lose strength, even though it still erroneously promotes this vision as the solution to congestion and transport problems.

Philipson said Lagos State, like several other evolving commercial cities in developing countries is witnessing rapid urbanisation and economic growth, which ultimately could accelerate the number of motor vehicles per one thousand people compared to the past 30 years.

“Owning a private car or a motorised two-wheeler is a major aspiration for people in Lagos particularly, where public transport service is often inadequate and unsafe.

“Unfortunately, city managers are not doing enough to assuage the rapid urbanisation that is fast inspiring the culture of car-oriented transport development patterns,” he said.

Dean, School of Transport, Lagos State University, Prof. Samuel Odewumi, said there is no specific time for law enforcement agency to carry out their duties. Anytime is a good time.

Odewumi said motorist or vehicle owners should be given enough notice because the essence of the operation is to rectify not to punish or arrest adding that the Lagos state police command should give a long notice for people to get their documents intact.

“With the way they are carrying out the operation, it seems to me that the objective is more to arrest, apprehend and extort motorist. If they give sufficient time, people will go and rectify. What the police did was to throw in panic into the air. There have been pressure on Lagos state government for all the bad roads, something tells me it is not unlikely, they want to they want to use it to douse, because by the time people run off the road, there will be light traffic and all those who are planning mass action will have no justification for it again,” he said.

On how to reduce traffic on Lagos roads, Odewumi said: “If the operational template is to arrest, police will face arresting and collecting toll gates from people but If the objective of the operation is to keep traffic flowing, the operational service will be different. If othering sister agencies like Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), and Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA), are given the opportunity to operate within their workgroup, traffic would be better managed.

“For stemming traffic, it has driven many people off the road, but if the idea is to keep the traffic flowing freely, it is not this type of knee jack, ad-hoc arrangement that can get the traffic free flowing, it will require more thinking and more strategic and tactical solutions.

An expert on road safety issues, Patrick Adenusi, said: “it is late to say this is the right time to implement such an operation. It is being sentimental. It is long overdue. The lawlessness in the country is unimaginable.

Adenusi also doubles as the Director of advocacy, Safety beyond Borders, a non-governmental organisation, said the Lagos state government through the Ministry of Transport with LASTMA and the Vehicle Inspection Service, and Ministry of Information, should begin a massive enlightenment campaign on how to use the road

Adenusi said: “If the goal of the police is to reduce traffic, then their approach was wrong because if the goal is to reduce traffic, they do not necessarily need to stop a vehicle, asking them for razor blades, flashlights that will compound the already nasty situation that we are in.”

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