The National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW), Lagos State Chapter, has unveiled its first 3,000 Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) commercial tricycles worth N10.2 billion to ease transport challenges.
The CNG was launched by Alhaji Azeez Abiola, one of the NURTW chieftains, on Wednesday in Lagos.
Abiola, the Zonal Chairman, Tricycle Owners and Operators Association of Nigeria under the NURTW, said the initiative would bring succour to the masses by reducing the lingering cost of transportation.
“Over 3,000 CNG tricycles have been deployed to the state to ease the cost of transportation among the residents and at the same time reduce economic hardship.
“We thank God Almighty for the opportunity to launch this laudable project with the support of President Bola Tinubu.
“As we launch this initiative today, residents will begin to experience a reduction in the cost of transportation within their locality.
“This is the number one CNG commercial tricycle in the country that will be in operation. This is because the 3,000 tricycles will begin operations on Thursday.
“This development will reduce the cost of living among our people drastically because it costs a tricyclist N15,000 fuel to operate daily, while CNG operation will cost between N2,500 and N3,000 for daily operations,” he said.
He said the initiative would create over 5,000 new jobs for operators and technicians in charge of CNG conversions.
He also commended the President for the opportunity to venture into the new CNG operation for commercial purposes.
“We also appreciate the support of our state NURTW chairman for this initiative and for making it possible for members to be beneficiaries.
“With this development, we are going to engage hundreds of our members, fix them in the system and monitor their operations from excessive charges,” he said.
Abiola, however, appealed to the government to establish the CNG station within the locality of operators for easy refilling access.
“The only challenge we are having now is that of the CNG filling station which is only situated at Agidingbi in Ikeja, while our members are operating in Alagbado, Agbado-Okeodo, Ifako-Ijaiye, Agege and Alimosho.
“We also want the government to lift the ban of tricycles on the routes linked to the CNG filling station to make refilling easier,” he said. (Vanguard)