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From Uche Usim, Abuja
There were fears, yesterday, of imminent scarcity of other petroleum products as the Petroleum Tankers Division (PTD) of the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) is spoiling for war over the deplorable state of Nigerian roads.
National President of the union, Mr Salmon Oladiti, at a press conference in Abuja lamented the spate of accidents occasioned by bad roads and the attendant devastation to their businesses threat to lives of tanker drivers.
He said the union would down tools a very short notice.
“We’re tired of accidents, being stranded on the roads for weeks, risk of attacks by kidnappers, bandits and terrorists. These criminals have taken over some of these roads. We’ve been on this matter of bad roads for more than three years and last year, we reached an agreement with the NNPC which promised to rehabilitate these critical roads and earmarked N621 billion for it. Some of these roads are less than 25km in length. Tanker crashes were almost a daily occurrence. Security challenge on these roads can’t be overemphasised.”
He alleged that funds meant for the road maintenance projects were diverted or misapplied.
“This is an open day robbery, but we are assuring all and sundry that our union will go to all lengths to expose these individuals. Every kobo of the approved fund must be accounted for and we must see and broadcast the pre and post rehabilitation of all the identified 21 federal road to the whole nation. Tax payers’ money must be accounted for. We urge every patriotic Nigerians to rise up and join us in this struggle, this is not a fight for NUPENG alone, it is our collective fight,” he said.
