Security: Keke riders association to tackle recklessness

The National Commercial Tricycle and Motorcycle Owners and Riders Association (NACTOMORAS), Abuja chapter, says it will introduce a security measure to reduce reckless riding by its members within the FCT.

Mr Musa Ibrahim, the FCT Chairman of the association told News Journalist in Abuja on Wednesday that the association was working on an application which would be inserted in the mobile phones.

According to him, the aim is to monitor its members as they ride their tricycles within the FCT and its environs.

“We are aware of some of the insecurity and recklessness complaints by passengers; however, we are making efforts to ensure the success and implementation of the security application.

“We have got most of the things required to ensure this is put in place as you can see, we even have a TV stationed already to enable us watch their activities.

“We have registered our members and will ensure they are all registered digitally for this process to be effective and so that we can monitor their movements across the city centre.

“Meanwhile, for some little challenges, we will have started but before long, this will become a thing of the past,” Ibrahim said.

He said the security application when implemented and functional, could be reversed from a particular moment up to eight hours back.

Ibrahim said this would go along way at resolving incidents of loss of items by passengers, adding that the association had several items at the office yet to be claimed by its owners.

He said that it would also help determine the party at fault in cases of accidents for appropriate prosecution.

“Presently, we have so many goods and missing items which our riders returned to the office and the owners are yet to claim, and some have stayed up to a year.

“We are trying to put measures in place to ensure we find appropriate means of helping these passengers who lost their items to retrieve them easily.’’

According to the chairman, the association is also engaging in some form of training for its members to educate them on proper road ethics and how to observe traffic rules and regulations.

He said in August, the association employed the services of one Gerado International Ltd., to help train its members on some of these issues and would ensure continuation of this training.

“We are trying our best to educate and to enlighten them. Most importantly, just last month, we did the flag-off of cleaning of our members.

“The training is to educate them on how to ensure good relationship with passengers and enlighten them on how to observe traffic rules and regulations.

“For security measures, we are progressing because if you observe, things are not like it used to be  due to the training and will try to maintain this,’’ Ibrahim said

Ibrahim said that the association had also trained some of its designated personnel and the tax force to help the various government security agencies enforce good ethics of its members.

On penalty for wrong doings, the chairman said the association had a constitution and guideline which members must abide by and anyone found wanting was penalised accordingly.

He listed some of the penalties to include arrest, suspension, fines and the like which would be administered based on the gravity of the offense.

NAN reports that there had been recurring complaints by passengers of the tricycle popularly called “ keke’’ on the recklessness of its riders within the FCT metropolis.

Some of the passengers decried that even when these riders are cautioned; they claim ignorance and continue in the act.

They urged relevant authorities to do something urgently about it to ensure peace and orderliness of the roads and safety of passengers in the country.