Pursuant to its sustained determination to address the menace of articulated vehicles on the nation’s highways, the Federal Road Safety Corps has concluded arrangements to commence a nationwide arrest and prosecution of drivers who overload their vehicles thus creating obvious traffic hazards for other road users.
Feelers from the Corps indicate that most drivers of tankers especially those who convey wet cargoes such as fuel, gasoline and kerosene, are in the habit of exceeding he axle load capacity of their trucks.
Speaking on this development, the FRSC Corps Marshal, Boboye Oyeyemi said “It is most disturbing to find drivers of tankers with 30,000 litres capacity, adding fire woods and other unnecessary items to highly inflammable substances with the tendency of resulting to fire outbreaks in the event of a road traffic crash”
In a further analysis, the Corps Marshal also said “the permissible maximum weight (gross weight) on the roads should not exceed 32 tons for heavy duty vehicles carrying two or more axle trailers and axle load not more than 9,600 kilograms (9.66 tons) as stipulated in the Federal Highway Act Cap 135 and regulation 145 (1) of the National Road Traffic Regulations 2012” he said.
According to him, “It therefore means that any trailer carrying 900 bags or 50 kilograms ie approximately 45 tons, is loaded beyond the permissible limit. In the same vein, a trailer conveying 45,000 litres of fuel, will weigh about 34 tons which has also exceeded the permissible weight”
“This attitude is unacceptable especially in view of the robust partnership which the Corps has built with stakeholders in the haulage and transport sector such as the National Union of Road Transport (NURTW), National Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO), NUPENG- Petroleum Tanker Drivers and Road Transport Employees Association of Nigeria (RTEAN) to enthrone sanity and decorum in their activities” he added.
Against this backdrop and pursuant to the Corps’ renewed determine to ensure safer roads, the FRSC has directed its Commanding Officers and patrol operatives to commence immediate nationwide clampdown on overloaded tankers, trucks and motor vehicles which violate the provisions of section 122 of the National Road Traffic Regulations on lighting system as many don’t have reflectors and adequate rear light…
It will be recalled that the Corps recently flagged off this year’s Ember month campaigns along the Onitsha axis as part of measures to address not only the menace of tankers and trucks but to also ensure improved road conduct among other category of vehicles and road users.