From: Ahmed Abubakar,Dutse
National President of the National Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO) has pleaded with security operatives to desist from the continued harassments of tanker and lorry drivers on the nation’s highways.
NARTO President, Dr. Kassim Ibrahim Bataiya spoke, on Wednesday, at the official launch of the distribution of 18-seater buses to their members by Governor Muhammed Abubakar Badaru of Jigawa State at the NYSC orientation camp in the state. He also charged security operatives to train their personnel on methods of international best practises of discharging their duties.
According to him, “It is disturbing the way and manner the security operatives have continued to harass our members that are on legitimate movements of transporting products to their various destinations across the country”.
He said most of the time security operatives lack the basic simple command of respect for drivers simply because they have chosen driving as a means of their livelihood.
He said, “The police should understand that these people have chosen to drive as their means of livelihood the same manner with which the police have also chosen their profession as a means of livelihood”, stressing that, “no profession is superior to another as long as they are lefitimate”.
On his part, the Governor Badaru said the state government organised the event to address problems faced by youths that formed the backbone of the society and women in line with the manifesto of the APC led government”, he stated.
Badaru assured the people of the state that, “25 tones of rice mills would be distributed to selected agro entrepreneurs in the heart of our rice production areas while paddy rice dealers will be empowered with capital to ensure a content supply of feedstock for the mills”, he stated.
He said, “rice dealers will be integrated into the cycle and also provided with capital to buy up the finished product and distribute across the whole sale and retail outlets within and outside the state”.