Hyacinth Chinweuba
Hakeem Odumosu, the new Police Commissioner in Lagos state has proved that he is not an arm chair CP, as he is always moving in the traffic and directing traffic.
At Maryland yesterday the dedicated CP was at Maryland Oando filling station where he directed the Managing Director Mr. Adeyinka Idris to make sure that the pavement at his station is put in order.
He further urged his officers not to clear traffic for him that he wanted to observe where the problems are as a citizen.
“We are declaring state of emergency on traffic in Lagos. As a commissioner of police, I am an operational man to the core and I need to meet my men on the road to feel what they are feeling on the road”
“We realized that one of the causes of traffic gridlocks these days is construction and that is why I left my office, we started all the way from my office to Maryland so some illegal bus stops that are creating problems now we have cleared them off and I have posted men there.
Then up to Oshodi the areas where they are descending to Oshodi or even by that junction when you are coming to Anthony where the construction starts, the four lanes coming from immediately you descend 3rd mainland bridge to Gbagada inward Oshodi in front of the filling station where construction starts we realized that there is congestion there so, I have posted men there now to manage traffic.
Even the front of LASTMA office inward under Oshodi bridge, there are many abandoned vehicle by the road side which has reduced the width of the road which causes alots of problem which we have been able to clear as we speak and under the bridge inward Capper there are bad portions of the road there which I have called the authorities in charge and they are going to repair it by tomorrow so from there moving through railway crossing we discovered there are issues so we had to move Anifowose area and all the buses that parked there we have given them ultimatum to vacate the place because we discovered that traffic coming from Oba-Akran, Oba AKinjobi and GRA all meet at the roundabout they move through Simbiat Abiola way and by the time they all gets to the roundabout where the road is bad then we have backlog up to Maryland area so we have cleared all the people selling just for free-flow of traffic.
“We then moved to Ogba, at Ashade road, we realized that Guinness company is parking their trucks on both sides of the road which is causing a lot of traffic on that axis but I have spoken with their CSO to move the trucks because that is creating problems up to Moshalasi Alhaja in Agege”
Odumosu continues: “so if they fail to do that, then we take necessary actions. We want to ensure that traffic must flow in Lagos and that is why you see me with the Area Commanders, the DPOs of the Areas to help digest the problems on ground. I don’t just seat in my office and send my men out to go and control the traffic and not knowing what their feelings are and that is why I came out to see things myself and I am taking it one after the other and I will go round Lagos like that to see the problems and all the ones we have solved today, collectively, I know traffic will flow in Ikeja axis, from Maryland, GRA to Awolowo way up to Iyana Ipaja now traffic will flow”
The CP further stated that the state of emergency is still on “Operation Move Traffic” and it will be on till next year 2020. Christmas must remain traffic flow because volume of people will move to Lagos and that is why we are doing this towards the Christmas period”
As we are doing this simultaneously we are going attacking the criminals too because the royal task force is set out and you will begin to see reactions now, so all the cultist boys, awawa boys, one billion boys and the miscreants we are going headlong with them Lagos must be free.
In Odumosu”s words “Once again, I am warning the members of the public that driving against the traffic, that it is a punishable offence and no compromise and I am warning all the force personnel too, you must not be in front of commercial vehicles. I just arrested two now who were in front of trucks and encouraging them to drive against the traffic, RRS has just arrested them no compromise in law enforcement under my watch and that is why I am out, wherever the bottle neck is, we must find solution to it and that is the task and is the ambition”
“You know I carry everybody along because that is the essence of community policing as you could see when we were at OSHodi I called them out and we had discussion on how to move vehicles in front of their office and we all move round and they have agreed to move them and even agreed to put palliative measures in place at their own level even before the government intervenes so that is traffic unions coming in positively whereby they don’t do that then we have the law to take its course but I will give them a benefit of doubt because we had discussion and agreements, we both observed the situations together trekking about 10km together identifying traffic issues and their causes. So you can see that we are all physically on ground and this is not just making noise in the newspapers and TV, they can see that we mean business.
He however, stated that the immediate deployment of an additional one thousand police officers for traffic duties is meant to help address the menace.
Recall that Odumosu took the decision during an emergency meeting he summoned at the Command Headquarters to review the current traffic situation in the state.
According to Odumosu, “The measure would help in ensuring the free flow of traffic and would also curb the menace of traffic robbery”.
He urged Lagosians to accord police officers on traffic duties maximum cooperation in the discharge of their statutory duties.
