The
Nigeria Labour Congress has said that something must be wrong with the
Senate for trying to re-introduce toll gates in our roads.
The Nigerian Senate
The Nigeria Labour Congress on Thursday in Abuja, berated the
Senate over its approval for the re-introduction of toll gates across
the country. The NLC General Secretary, Dr Peter Ozo-Eson, while
reacting to the development, said that Nigeria’s policy making processes
needed to be interrogated.
The Senate had on Tuesday passed a motion seeking to resuscitate
the collection of tolls on federal highways across the country. The
Upper House argued that toll collection from motorists was the only way
to construct and maintain roads and enhance their efficiency.
Sen. Suleiman Nazif, representing Bauchi-North Senatorial District, moved the motion entitled “Need for the re-establishment of tolls on our federal highways”. The Senate based its decision on the state of the country’s infrastructure, including roads, which it described as worrisome.
It attributed the situation to corruption and mismanagement of resources over the years.
However, Ozo-Eson, in his reaction said, “We used to have toll
gates and we started them under pressure from the World Bank and
International Monetary Fund, among others.
“We built a number of toll gates and the government itself came and tore down those structures.
“To come back again to re-introduce the toll gates means
another waste of public resources and this shows that something is
fundamentally wrong.”
The general secretary said that the initial implementation of the
toll gates suffered a lot of setback due to a number of issues.
He also noted that the nation never benefited from the first
experience as some set of people fed fat on the tolls and the roads were
never maintained.
He said, “Unless we are able to put in place a mechanism that
will ensure that the revenues from the tolls are used for the
development and maintenance of the roads, any attempt to bring the toll
gates will again be a failure.
“The proposal is questionable, coming at a time when people are
facing undue hardship, including high cost of living occasioned by
policies of government.”
Ozo-Eson said that the proposed reintroduction of tolls at this time would be excessively worrisome to all Nigerians.
He said that such a policy would further escalate inflation rate which peaked at 17.6 per cent in August.
He argued that the need for revenue generation and the hardship
faced by the people should be placed side by side in reaching a decision
on the matter.
Tolls were abolished by former President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2004,
who argued that the revenue for road maintenance should rather be
generated from an increased pump price of petrol.
-NAN
No comments:
Post a Comment