THE Otedola Bridge on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway is gradually becoming a deadly spot for motorists as lives and properties are being lost on a regular basis in the last few years. Another carnage was recorded last week when a gas tanker fell and spilled its contents, which ignited a fire in the area.
As at the last count, four lives were lost and more than 10 vehicles were destroyed. Two friends who are journalists escaped the inferno by the whiskers, but lost their vehicles in the process. A mechanic handling one of our media colleague’s car also died from the inferno.
Who will bear the responsibility for the lives lost and properties burnt to ashes? Is it the Lagos State Government or the Federal Government? Or is it the truck owner and the driver that should be held accountable for the dastardly act? Until there is a class action against the federal and perhaps, the Lagos State government, and truck owners, nothing much will change as those appointed to prevent such a disaster have shown crass incompetence.
The latest inferno on the bridge is not the first, and it would definitely not be the last. Those in charge simply sympathize with the victims through watery press statements and the victims are left to bear the brunt of their incompetence. A chronicle of past tanker inferno on the same portion of the road shows that many of those in charge have been allowed to get away with murder.
On September 20, 2019, a diesel tanker fell off while driving along the Otedola bridge. There was no fire outbreak, as, thankfully, the tanker was empty. Few days later, precisely on October 10, 2019, a tanker carrying 33,000 litres of fuel driving towards Berger had an accident resulting in fuel spillage on the road. Four persons sustained injuries due to the accident, according to Lagos State Emergency Management Agency. In the same month, a tanker with full capacity of 45,000 litres of petrol fell at the bridge. The fuel was immediately trans loaded by the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA) to avoid explosion while causing major traffic in the process.
Again, on May 5, 2020, loaded tankers laden with kerosene and diesel respectively, had a head-on collision in-ward Berger, but thankfully, there was no casualty. On the 21st of the same month, another tanker collided with a bus, killing one and injuring a few others. On, October 17, 2020, a container truck loaded with fabric collided with a petrol tanker, both vehicles were completely razed in the fire caused as a result.
Three months later, on December 20, 2020, 11 people sustained injuries when a tanker, loaded with diesel, exploded on the same Otedola bridge. On March 27, 2021, a tanker filled with petrol collided with a truck carrying a container. Seven vehicles were burned as a result. On May 28, 2021, a fuel-laden tanker was gutted by fire while descending from Otedola Bridge which allegedly resulted from an electrical fault it developed while on motion. This led to disruption of vehicular movement for hours. But the worst accident on the bridge was recorded in June, 2018, when a tanker laden with petroleum products exploded, killing at least 12 people and destroying 54 vehicles. Statistics from the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) also states that Nigeria lost $9.8 billion to tanker accidents in 2018 alone.
In this part of the globe, we pay scant attention to the lives of people and property. After a few days of these misfortunes, everybody moves on and await the next accident to happen. It is a known fact that most articulated vehicles find it difficult to move on the bridge once they carry any load, be it petrol, diesel or any other goods. As a way of reducing carnage on the road, the Lagos State government restricted the movement of fuel tankers to between 12 midnight and 4a.m on the route. Perhaps, the law would be implemented next year. The latest fire accident on the bridge happened around 8p.m in the night when traffic is usually at its peak as workers would be on their way home. In essence, we simply made a law with nobody on ground to enforce it.
Interestingly, there are various security agencies within the same vicinity, many of which are mainly interested in extorting car owners on flimsy excuses while ignoring the excesses of commercial bus drivers and their senior brothers in charge of articulated vehicles.
Again, the fact is that the majority of the drivers of petrol tankers and other articulated vehicles barely have time to rest and are prone to committing avoidable errors on the road, leading to accidents and colossal tragedies. From investigation, some of them wait endlessly to be attended to at depots, ports, and other rendezvous points where they take their consignments for onward delivery at designated places in other parts of the country. During the periods of waiting, they carouse all day and all night long, abusing alcohol and other dangerous drugs. When they are eventually attended to and ready to embark on their usually long journeys, they are often mentally and physically tired.
Without proper sleep or rest, they hit the road, and to ensure that they keep up with their deadlines, they resort to the use of all sorts of energy drinks and enhancers, including alcohol and other dangerous beverages and drugs in order to keep alert and stay awake, according to them. This impairs their senses of judgment on the road and at times, they simply sleep off on the wheel. They then become accidents waiting to happen. And because of their states of physical exhaustion and metal incapacitation, such accidents, like the one that recently occurred in Lagos, have become one too an occurrence.
The time has come for a coordinated approach to put a stop to these avoidable carnage on our roads. It will not be out of place to begin a regime of examination of the state of tankers and other articulated vehicles to determine their road-worthiness. In addition, carrying out random tests of the drivers at loading bays, ports, depots and other point where they converge. The drivers should be tested for drugs, and when it is discovered that they are mentally or physically impaired, they should be stopped from driving.
The FRSC should also ensure that it enforces its policy on the compulsory installation of speed limiting devices on these vehicles to the letter. Only certified drivers and vehicles should be on the roads at the designated times of their movement. Those who employ the drivers should also be more concerned with their physical and mental wellbeing, as well as the insurance of their vehicles. Some of the drivers employed are too young to drive, while some of them are also too old to drive. They also lack training on road safety and health, security, safety, and environment (HSSE) protection laws. The governments at all levels should begin the comprehensive enforcement of all relevant laws and regulations relating to human and road safety.
As expected, the Lagos State Commissioner for Transportation, Oluwaseun Osiyemi, during the week, led a team from the ministry to the accident scene to ‘’assess’’ the situation. However, he is now ready to implement all existing laws which barred trucks from moving during the day time. Hear him: “We came here to do an assessment of the situation of what happened few days ago. We’ve sent an initial team, but we had to come ourselves to confirm the situation and also see what actually went wrong. But what we’ve been able to at least see immediately is the fact that, one, there’s a road sign right there that says ‘no truck allowed’.
And for the truck to be on this axis, evidently, it’s violated the law of Lagos State. As the Ministry of Transportation, I’m going to take steps to ensure that we enforce that sign, maybe by way of barrier and not allowing such trucks to ply this kind of road. When you look at the road, it’s quite undulated, and it’s not even motorable for those kinds of trucks. So, the whole essence is one, assess what’s on the ground; two, to be able to bring up things that would avert such situations.”
He attributed the cause of the accident to poor truck maintenance, citing the failure of truck owners to properly inspect and maintain their vehicles. This, he noted, has led to a surge in accidents involving trucks on Lagos roads. To address this issue, he hinted that the state government is working with the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) to inspect trucks and ensure they are roadworthy. “There’s a lot of collaboration ongoing on how to, one, inspect these trucks and make sure they are roadworthy, and, two, if they are not roadworthy, of course, they are going to be confiscated. We will do our role by inspecting and clamping down on trucks that are not roadworthy,” Osiyemi stated. End of story. Or at least until the next disaster strikes.
While the Otedola bridge is gradually becoming a nightmare to users, the underpass is also another failure in engineering as there has been several accidents recorded there as well, due to the narrowness of the road. Now, some residents of the area are attributing the incessant accidents on the axis to some satanic forces laying siege on the bridge to suck people’s blood. While people have the right to believe whatever suits their fancy, it should be pointed out that if those who are expected to protect lives and property have done their bit, the carnage on the axis of the bridge would reduce, if not completely eliminated.
Indeed, if we are to stop the carnage on our roads, we must begin to hold critical stakeholders in the transport sector accountable. The authorities at both the states and the federal government must unearth the owners of such vehicles, name and shame them, ensure that compensations are paid to the victims and their families, and the state/federal government, and prosecute them for criminal negligence and wilful damage to public property. Where it is established that such accidents may have occurred because of the bad state of our roads, which is often the case, the federal or state governments should also be held liable for criminal neglect by the victims. But above all, the authorities should begin to device a way of putting an end to such recurrences on our roads.
May the souls of those that died from the carnage last week rest in perfect peace.
See you next week.
- Akintunde is the Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Glittersonline newspaper. His syndicated column, Monday Discourse, appears on News Point Nigeria newspaper on Mondays.