Hell was let loose recently at the Brown street, Oshodi as hoodlums and touts who claimed membership of the National Union of Road Transport Workers turned the ever-busy and yet-to-be transformed modern garage into a theatre of war and slaughter slab. Armed with all sorts of dangerous weapons, including guns, machetes, cutlasses and broken bottles, the bandits set aside last Wednesday for the mayhem killing one person and injuring several others.
Property worth millions were destroyed. The warring factions clashed over chairmanship tussle. The fierce and daring Agberos seem to have assumed a more menacing dimension. They unleash terror on people across locations in the state especially when factions of the group want to assume leadership of the Union.
It was gathered that in Oshodi, Ketu, Mushin, Ikorodu and other strategic motor parks, the union rake in millions of naira daily from commercial dirvers through several levies. Saturday Vanguard checks revealed that levies such Task-force levy, Traffic levy, LASMTA levy, Environmental and Police levies among others are being collected forcefully from commercial drivers everyday.
If any bus driver refuses, they either smash the vehicle’s side mirrors, pull off bus’ wipers and at another occasion, cause traffic obstruction at will. No security agents dare stop them. Leaders of the union live like kings and emperors in their territories. One wonders if the money being collected by these miscreants go into government’s purse as taxes, it would go a long way in augmenting the IGR of the state while government would be more responsible to its duties of building and maintaining roads across the state.
Yet government closes eyes on the activities of these groups as they wreak havoc on hapless and helpless commercial bus drivers extorting money from them daily and unleashing mayhem at will. Some of those who spoke with Saturday Vanguard on the issue identified lack of political will on the part of government to nipping the activities of the NURTW in the bud. Isiaka Adejumo, a resident in Alimosho area said:
“Granted that they are registered under our laws, government has failed to control their activities withing the purview of the law. Some of these guys are well connected with people in the corridors of power, sometimes, they use them during elections and that is why government closes its eyes on their activities,” said Adejumo. Others opined that complicity of the law enforcement agents with the activities of the garage boys was part of the reason they operate unhindered.
In the recent past, government banned their activities at both motor parks and at bus stops. But that did not deter them as the Agberos are still in business in all motor parks and garages as usual without hindrance; even on the highways.
The Oshodi saga is one of the numerous mayhem unleashed by these garage guys and may not be the last as there is no strict measure put in place by the government and law enforcement agents to stem the tide. It was gathered that most of these miscreants had been arrested and convicted by courts before and after serving their jail terms often return to the area to continue their illegal acts.
A resident, who simply identified himself as, Mr. A. Tunde, said, “The miscreants have refused to leave Oshodi, in spite of several efforts by government to dislodge them. Their number keeps increasing by the day. We learnt that, those miscreants who were flushed out from Lagos Island, such as: Obalende, Idumota, Bar-Beach, do find save haven in Oshodi. “I therefore, urge Governor Akinwunmi Ambode and police authority, to give Oshodi top priority by deploying adequate security personnel including men of Department of Security Service, DSS.
“The state government should also speed up the transformation plan into modern garage in order to fully reclaim the area from the miscreants.” Meantime, the Lagos State Environmental Sanitation and Special Offences Unit, Task Force, for the month of February, 2016, has arrested 986 miscreants out of which 152 were screened out and the remaining 834 were prosecuted and convicted.
While some of these arrested miscreants were brought to the agency for prosecution from various Police Divisions across the state others were arrested by operatives of the Task Force at their hideouts in Oshodi, Mile 2, Yaba, Bariga, Somolu, Festac, Ojodu-Berger, Obalende among others.
They were convicted by both Magistrate Adepejo Odusanya and Magistrate Mobolaji Tanimola of the Lagos State Environmental and Special Offences Court, Ogba, Ikeja for various environmental offenses and they were fined fees ranging from N5,000 to N10,000 as an option of three to six months imprisonment with community services where necessary.
Hell was let loose recently at the Brown street, Oshodi as hoodlums and touts who claimed membership of the National Union of Road Transport Workers turned the ever-busy and yet-to-be transformed modern garage into a theatre of war and slaughter slab. Armed with all sorts of dangerous weapons, including guns, machetes, cutlasses and broken bottles, the bandits set aside last Wednesday for the mayhem killing one person and injuring several others.
Property worth millions were destroyed. The warring factions clashed over chairmanship tussle. The fierce and daring Agberos seem to have assumed a more menacing dimension. They unleash terror on people across locations in the state especially when factions of the group want to assume leadership of the Union.
It was gathered that in Oshodi, Ketu, Mushin, Ikorodu and other strategic motor parks, the union rake in millions of naira daily from commercial dirvers through several levies. Saturday Vanguard checks revealed that levies such Task-force levy, Traffic levy, LASMTA levy, Environmental and Police levies among others are being collected forcefully from commercial drivers everyday.
If any bus driver refuses, they either smash the vehicle’s side mirrors, pull off bus’ wipers and at another occasion, cause traffic obstruction at will. No security agents dare stop them. Leaders of the union live like kings and emperors in their territories. One wonders if the money being collected by these miscreants go into government’s purse as taxes, it would go a long way in augmenting the IGR of the state while government would be more responsible to its duties of building and maintaining roads across the state.
Yet government closes eyes on the activities of these groups as they wreak havoc on hapless and helpless commercial bus drivers extorting money from them daily and unleashing mayhem at will. Some of those who spoke with Saturday Vanguard on the issue identified lack of political will on the part of government to nipping the activities of the NURTW in the bud. Isiaka Adejumo, a resident in Alimosho area said:
“Granted that they are registered under our laws, government has failed to control their activities withing the purview of the law. Some of these guys are well connected with people in the corridors of power, sometimes, they use them during elections and that is why government closes its eyes on their activities,” said Adejumo. Others opined that complicity of the law enforcement agents with the activities of the garage boys was part of the reason they operate unhindered.
In the recent past, government banned their activities at both motor parks and at bus stops. But that did not deter them as the Agberos are still in business in all motor parks and garages as usual without hindrance; even on the highways.
The Oshodi saga is one of the numerous mayhem unleashed by these garage guys and may not be the last as there is no strict measure put in place by the government and law enforcement agents to stem the tide. It was gathered that most of these miscreants had been arrested and convicted by courts before and after serving their jail terms often return to the area to continue their illegal acts.
A resident, who simply identified himself as, Mr. A. Tunde, said, “The miscreants have refused to leave Oshodi, in spite of several efforts by government to dislodge them. Their number keeps increasing by the day. We learnt that, those miscreants who were flushed out from Lagos Island, such as: Obalende, Idumota, Bar-Beach, do find save haven in Oshodi. “I therefore, urge Governor Akinwunmi Ambode and police authority, to give Oshodi top priority by deploying adequate security personnel including men of Department of Security Service, DSS.
“The state government should also speed up the transformation plan into modern garage in order to fully reclaim the area from the miscreants.” Meantime, the Lagos State Environmental Sanitation and Special Offences Unit, Task Force, for the month of February, 2016, has arrested 986 miscreants out of which 152 were screened out and the remaining 834 were prosecuted and convicted.
While some of these arrested miscreants were brought to the agency for prosecution from various Police Divisions across the state others were arrested by operatives of the Task Force at their hideouts in Oshodi, Mile 2, Yaba, Bariga, Somolu, Festac, Ojodu-Berger, Obalende among others.
They were convicted by both Magistrate Adepejo Odusanya and Magistrate Mobolaji Tanimola of the Lagos State Environmental and Special Offences Court, Ogba, Ikeja for various environmental offenses and they were fined fees ranging from N5,000 to N10,000 as an option of three to six months imprisonment with community services where necessary.
Vanguard
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