With the perennial gridlock in Apapa, Lagos, a safety expert has raised concern about safety of buildings, factories, tank farms and workers in the area in case of major fire incident as it will really be difficult for any rescue operations to access Apapa.
Raising this concern in a talk with BusinessDay, Jumade Adejola, CEO of Surveillant Fire Limited, regretted that the gridlock was heavy, which would not allow any fire safety truck to move in to the area.
“The only way to fight fire in such area is through aerial operation and this can only be possible through helicopter.
“Aerial fire fighting is inevitable because fighting fire where there is gridlock is difficult. The damage would have been done if there is not space to get there,” he said, and suggested that big companies in Apapa should enter into agreement with helicopter operators to fight fire or for evacuation of workers in case of heavy fire occurrence.
There has not been permanent solution to Apapa gridlock in the last seven years, especially in the face of increased activity at the ports. Nigeria has other seaports in other regions, but Apapa seaports are more functional controlling about 90 percent of import and export activity.
In the recent time, many businesses have relocated from Apapa and according to a clearing agent, who identified himself as Ekene more businesses are likely to leave the area because of inaccessibility of their offices by their workers, which is impacting negatively on their business.
Meanwhile gutters and waste dumps in the Apapa area of Lagos have been converted into toilets by tanker drivers who are trapped in the gridlock. Passers-by say this portents health hazards for residents and workers within the area.
The truck and tanker drivers are on a simple mission. Their business is to go to Nigeria’s busiest seaport in Apapa to haul containers, petrol, diesel or gas and deliver to other parts of the country, but they are not finding this assignment easy.
Over 85 percent of ships carrying different goods, including fuel from foreign countries berth in Lagos. With this large business at Apapa seaport, trucks and tankers in different shapes and sizes sleep on Lagos roads, attempting to lift goods to the hinterland. Others are also returning containers back to the Wharf. With the bad and narrow roads associated with Apapa, these trucks and tankers cause gridlock and chaos within the area.
Some of these drivers who want to avoid paying for parking space have turned all the roads, highways and bridges leading to the port into parking lots.
What is more amazing is that these roads which include M2 through Coconut to Apapa, Orile-Apapa, Western Avenue, right from Ojuelegba to Apapa and Carter Bridge have not only become parking lots for the tankers and the trucks but bedrooms, toilets and bathrooms for the drivers and the other occupants in the vehicles.
The drivers and their motor assistants hardly take their bath for as long as they park on the roads. They buy water from hawkers; wash their faces and legs early in the morning and prepare for the crawling journey to Wharf. “For excretion of faeces, it is done anywhere they find convenient,” a worker within the area, said.
“We look for public toilets but when we don’t see, we take our bath on the road early in the morning”, Ibrahim Raufu who was by the driver’s side of a numberless 40-feet truck which was lifting container to Ojota, in Lagos told BusinessDay.
“For toilet, we do it in nylon bag and throw it in a nearby bush, gutter or in any heap of dustbin”, Raufu who was relating his life as a truck driver said while giving a smile that suggests that they don’t have alternative.
He said the drivers and their assistants hardly sleep in the night or they sleep in turns for security purposes. “When one person is sleeping, the other person will be awake. If you sleep too much, thieves can remove your motor battery or other useful things. So you have to be watchful.”
