By Moses Ebosele, ebosele@hotmail.com —
To consolidate on the gains recorded by the Truck Transit Parks (TTP), owners of Eto App, the management of the company has appealed to all stakeholders to abide by laid down procedures.
Eto App is an Electronic Truck call-up system designed for the management of truck movement and access to and from the Lagos Seaports.
Speaking at an interactive session with journalists on Thursday in Lagos, Chief Operating Officer, TTP, Mr Temidayo Adeboye, said:“Today, trucks must enter the transit parks to be able to access the port and we are using timing belt to batch and schedule different categories of trucks.
“This is partly the reason why trucks that pay their way to the port do not have
access because the access barriers will not open for them.”
Explaining further, Adeboye said plans are underway to bring major and independent oil marketers onboard Eto App as part of measures to further curtail the traffic gridlock along the seaport’s axis in Lagos State.
Making reference to the high volume of traffic witnessed daily by motorists on the Mile 2- Tin-Can Island Port axis, Adeboye attributed the challenge to the heavy concentration of oil and gas tank farms that are not onboard Eto platform.
He also used the opportunity to explain that the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) had met with Federal and Lagos state governments to direct contractors involved in the construction along Mile 2- Tin-Can Island Port axis to put friendly traffic modalities in place.
He explained that there are five entry points at the Apapa axis while Tincan is three: Abuja, first gate and second gate.
Adeboye advised truck drivers to desist from indiscriminate parking of trucks and tankers on the road.
He explained that initial efforts made by TTP to tackle the Apapa traffic challenge revealed that NPA had 50 percent of the traffic; oil and gas, 30; fast-moving consumer goods and others 20 percent coupled with the extortion going on at the port corridor.
He advised all stakeholders to take advantage of the eto App, adding that tremendous progress had been recorded.
Adeboye also dismissed insinuations that the eto App had been hacked, adding that “The only thing that had happened was people taking the ticket in the past to business centres to go and photocopy, edit and use.
“But, we have gone around these things, even the edited tickets can no longer work; it worked before because of human interface, so with the technology deployed, it has cleared everything.”
Speaking in a similar vein, the Head of Corporate Development, Mr Bolaji Akerele, explained that Eto App had reduced the cost at which trucks enter into the port down to between N15, 000 and N25, 000, from between N100, 000 and N150, 000.
