The Zonal Commanding Officer of the Federal Road Safty Commision (FRSC), Charlse Akpabio, has announced the relocation of the Zonal office from Benin to Asaba to contain the Niger bridge traffic.
Speaking at Onitsha, Anambra state, Akpabio said that the relocation of the office just after the bridge was to ensure smooth flow of traffic on the bridge.
The bridge has remained the major linkage to the Easthern part of the country and a busy one at that.
The Niger Bridge traditionally experiences a traffic upsurge during the
yuletide as thousands of people travel home for the Christmas celebrations
in the days before the festival.
“Normally, we have a national operations of this nature, when we expect increase in volume of vehicular movements and human traffic on the corridors.
“As a commanding officer supervising the three states, it will not be ideal for me to sit in Benin and be hearing from my personnel on telephone or other communication gadgets on what is happening on the road.
“But rather I have decided as a team player to relocate from Benin to Asaba so that I will see on the spot what the men are doing; what should be done and the ideal way of handling the affairs of the operations for this period.
“That would be an added advantage on my own part and motivation to my staff.
“Even before their arrival I am already on the road.
“ Definitely, there is no way they can sit in their offices and fail to carry out their assignments.
“So I believe I used this strategy last year and it worked out effectively well.’’
According to him, the zone is still expecting more vehicular and logistics support from the headquarters within few days.
The zonal commander, however, advised commuters to look out for drivers who were drunk before boarding commercial vehicles.
“Experience has shown that towards the end of year, traffic is usually high with most motorists not conforming to traffic rules and regulations due to improperly planned travel times leading to speeding and dangerous driving.
“Again, commercial drivers do undertake as many trips as possible for financial gains and this could lead to increase in road traffic crashes (RTC).
“Some other drivers must know that safety is more important than the money they make.’’ the commissioner said.
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