The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) says it will engage military authorities on the need to relax military check points to make road users more comfortable during the end of year festivities.
The Corps Marshall of the FRSC, Boboye Oyeyemi, disclosed this when he addressed State House Correspondents on the activities of the commission in Abuja on Thursday.
He, however, said that the relaxation of the check points should not jeopardise the security of the road users or the general public.
“On military check points, we are taking it up with the Chief of Defense Staff so that this can be relax a bit at the peak period.
“But, we cannot jeopardize what the military is doing in terms of security but we will work with them.
“Every year the Nigerian Air Force normally supports us with helicopters for aerial surveillance.
“One of the successes of recorded is the ability to carry out aerial surveillance during the festive period. This year is not an exemption that we are going to get the support of the Chief of Air Staff for the release of two helicopters for aerial surveillance.’’ he added.
The Corps Marshall said that the commission would be deploying 21,000 personnel and 1, 000 patrol vehicles across the country, to ensure free flow of traffic and safety on the highways during the Yuletide.
He revealed that the operations of the corps had been divided into three segments, namely; pre-Christmas, post-Christmas and post-New year, which will run from Dec. 15 to Jan. 15, 2019.
The FRSC boss said for easy coordination, the country has been partitioned into 52 corridors.
According to him, the FRSC is also collaborating with the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA) to achieve a common objective of ensuring safety on all highways, especially at the end of the year.
He said: “Both of us have been working together and we normally forward the Road Safety audit reports to FERMA and appropriate maintenance steps are being taken especially at the very critical areas.
“FERMA is carrying out palliative measures on all the critical areas on the highways, to ensure free flow of traffic.
“Our principal responsibility during this period is to ensure there are no gridlocks on the roads and people arrive at their various destinations safely.
“Also, all the recovery vehicles have been deployed to critical locations and we are also working with the private tow trucks operators so that per adventure if there is any breakdown of vehicle or trucks, we will be able to remove such obstructions immediately,’’ he said.
Oyeyemi used the opportunity to encourage Nigerians, especially road users, to make use of the toll free telephone number, 122, to report incidents or cases of accidents.
The Corps Marshall said the issues of overloading, drink driving and other traffic offences would also be addressed during the special operation across the country.
“We want to advise all the road users to plan their journeys but we are going to frown at overloading; any vehicle that is overloaded will not be allowed to continue the journey.
“And also like we did during the last Sallah festival, we conducted periodic vision ability test for all the drivers and that was when we raised the alarm that about 30 percent of the commercial drivers have vision problem.
“Anyone of them like that that we see, we may have to ground him and look for alternatives for the passengers to enable them get to their destination safe.
“We are already working with the National Union of Road Transport Workers to address the problem whenever we come across a driver with poor sight,” he added.
He said mobile courts would also be put in place to deal with cases of indiscipline and road traffic offences.
According to him, advocacy is currently going on at various motor parks across the country to sensitise drivers on some of the precautionary measures they need to take.
“We believe that with the advocacy and the education that is going on, we will be able to reach everybody in all the motor parks.
“For the mobile courts, 201 mobile courts will be activated nationwide next week.
“And the only appeal we want to make is for all road users to give maximum support to the corps and FERMA officials because FERMA is still doing palliative work as we are talking.
“So, areas where rehabilitation is going on, let us show a level of discipline and appreciate the efforts of government in ensuring that the roads are fixed during this dry season so that we can all get to our destinations safely,” he said.