Richard Ginika Izuora
The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) has reviewed its performance in the lockdown ordered by President Muhammadu Buhari to check the spread of Covid-19 and identified challenges it encountered in enforcing the order.
The Corps Public Education Officer (CPEO), FRSC, Mr Bisi Kazeem, stated this in a statement on Tuesday in Abuja.
Kazeem explained that Dr Boboye Oyeyemi, the Corps Marshal of the FRSC reviewed corps performance in an extraordinary virtual strategy meeting with FRSC’s top management team and the 12 Zonal Commanding Officers nationwide.
According to him, the teleconference meeting focused exclusively on reviewing the operational performance of the Corps with a view of identifying underlying challenges encountered in the course of the ongoing lockdown enforcement.
Kazeem said this was done to re-strategise on more effective, efficient and result yielding operational tactics that could enhance the general performance of the corps and facilitate compliance on the part of the people.
He noted that the enforcement so far had been successful, but there were challenges.
“There were cases of citizens defying both the physical distancing in vehicles and the national quarantine order without any justifiable reasons.
“Other challenges encountered include excessive overloading of vehicles both with persons and goods, especially the transporters who convey food produce from the farm or market places to consumers, production plants and other places where they may be needed.
“They also identified excessive speed, as majority of the drivers most often take undue advantage of the low traffic density to abuse the legal speed limit.
“This is an act which is very dangerous and could lead to avoidable crashes with attendant loss of lives and damage to properties,’’ Kazeem.
He said that the officers applauded the management of FRSC for the measures put in place to halt the spread of the virus through the provision of face masks, sanitisers and hand gloves to operatives.
Kazeem quoted Oyeyemi to have charged the operatives to brace up to the present realities as records had shown a consistent rise in Covid-19 cases in the country.
The Corps Marshal said that extra energy and commitment must be deployed to ensure that Nigerians were made to see reasons to comply with the Presidential Task force and NCDC directives.
He, however, emphasised on physical distancing in the vehicles, restriction of movement where applicable and the latest directive on ban on inter-state travels and curfewnan.