BY DAVID ADUGE-ANI, ABUJA
Worried by the wave of insecurity in the nation’s capital, the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA), through the Directorate of Road Traffic Services (DRTS), otherwise known as Vehicles Inspection Officers (VIOs), has so far impounded no fewer than 130 rickety vehicles in different parts of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
Director of DRTS, Dr. Abdulateef Bello disclosed this on Monday, after an inspection of the impounded vehicles kept at the various offices of the directorate at Bannex, Gwarinpa, Area 1 and Wuye command offices, as well as it’s headquarters in Mabushi.
Abdulateef alleged that most of the rickety vehicles operators used them for ‘One-chance’ and other related crimes in the Federal Capital City, while others were impounded for allegedly operating in the guise of commercial transport business, to perpetrate crime in the FCT.
He explained that the rationale for the raid is to ensure that the directorate operatives return the city back to sanity, remove all traces of insecurity and to ensure seamless traffic flow in the capital city.
He said: “For the last two weeks, we activated evening raids to ensure the operations of all substandard vehicles plying the city in the guise of commercial business, whereas many of them are running the city to perpetrate crime.
“This is an assignment that we have taken upon us in line with the vision of the current administration to guarantee zero tolerance to insecurity in the FCT.
“This, we will continue to do. We will not rest on our oars, until we ensure that all substandard (rickety) vehicles that are being used for criminality are removed from the city.”
Abdulateef noted that there is a substantial reduction in the rate of one-chance criminal activities in the city, due to what the directorate and other sister agencies have been doing in the last one month, to ensure that there is no vehicular businesses on the road corridors.
“We have been pushing them back to the existing taxi ranks and then for those who still want to engage vehicles outside the taxi ranks may be doing so at their own risk.
“We have substantially reduced the level of criminality that is associated with once, because what we started doing in the last one month is to ensure that there is no businesses on the road corridors.
“For individuals arrested on the basis of crime, we hand them over to the police and the police will definitely prosecute them.
“As for the vehicles, definitely we will have to subject the vehicle to all standard verification for registration, for road worthiness and all that. So, I think for us, our role is complementary. We just make sure that we support the right agencies to do their job.”
On what to do with the impounded vehicles, the DRTS boss, said: “Some of the vehicles that are here, some of them will be made to face the mobile court. The mobile court will decide the kind of penalty that will be given to them.
“But we have seen that there are some that definitely will not go back to the road. We are going to invite the owner, we will ask them to pick whatever is valuable in the vehicle, and the vehicle will be crushed.”