Tipper drivers in Onitsha, Anambra State, under the aegis of the Anambra Tippers Association, have threatened to protest the alleged forceful payment of various sums of money to the officials of the Anambra State Road Traffic Management Agency (ARTMA).
The chairman of the association, Ebuka Unekwe, who disclosed this to journalists in Onitsha on Thursday, alleged that ARTMA officials extort its members of money ranging from N200,000 and above under the guise of traffic control.
Unekwe said the ARTMA officials in Onitsha, led by one Akachukwu, claimed that the agency’s men were instructed by the agency’s managing director, Emeka Konti, to collect N200,000 from each tipper driver operating in the area.
He lamented that tipper drivers are being extorted in Anambra on a daily basis, noting that the roads from where they load the sand are dilapidated and unmotorable.
Unekwe complained that due to the unmotorable condition of the roads, vehicles always fall and often create problems for the drivers; hence, they resorted to plying Niger Street through Port Harcourt Road down to Upper Iweka, all in Onitsha.
He said, “When we drive to Upper Iweka to connect the flyovers, ARTMA officials and some security agents would suddenly jump into our tippers. They do this every night, and they compelled us to move into their park, where they forcefully collected N200,000 from us on the condition that it was Governor Chukwuma Soludo they were working for.
“The ARTMA officials do not accept cash transfers, but they insist that they must be given physical cash before any tipper in their net will be released. They are being led by one Akachukwu, an indigene of Ebonyi State, allegedly employed by the ARTMA Managing Director to act as their commander and ensure that the N200,000 were extorted from the tipper drivers and remitted to him privately.
“So far, between Tuesday and Wednesday alone, ARTMA officials have forcefully extorted N200,000 each from eight tipper drivers in the area. So this morning, some of us who loaded at Asaba and plied the road have been forcefully made to pay N200,000 to ARTMA.
“They demanded from each tipper driver in a day, and on getting to the Onitsha end of the Niger Bridge, precisely at Port Harcourt Road, adjacent to a military checkpoint, they also demanded that we pay again. At the end of the day, we don’t have anything to show for our efforts as ARTMA officials collect everything from us.”
He said that as a result of the continuous extortion, the tipper drivers have decided to stage a peaceful protest to draw the attention of the state governor, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, towards their plight.
“We call this press conference to notify the public that we will be staging a protest anytime soon to draw the attention of the governor to our plight. Things are getting out of hand, and it cannot continue like this.
“The ARTMA officials have become a thorn in our flesh through their continuous extortions. They have abandoned their core duty of traffic control and are now extorting the motoring public. Most of our members have abandoned Anambra routes.”
However, when contacted on the telephone, the Managing Director of ARTMA, Emeka Konti, denied the allegations, adding that he did not send any of his officials to collect N200,000 from tipper drivers.
“That is totally false. No official was asked to collect N200,000 from tipper drivers. We only asked the tipper drivers to stop plying one way at night; hence, they started the propaganda,” Konti added.
ALSO READ THESE TOP STORIES FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
Source: