Truck drivers protest in Adamawa, Niger, block roads

No fewer than 250 truck drivers have blocked the 60-kilometre Yola/Numan road in protest against alleged police brutality along the highway.

The protest, which commenced last Thursday at 9:00 pm, disrupted the free flow of motorists and commuters to neighbouring states of Gombe, Borno, Yobe and Taraba.

Abubakar Isa, an eyewitness and driver held in the gridlock, said:

“Many of our passengers were stranded for several hours without reaching their destinations.”

He added that some of the passengers had to postpone their journeys and sleep.

“The drivers’ protest against the police has disrupted vehicular movement,” Isa lamented, stating that he could not verify the cause of the protest.

He added: “Someone came and told us that the tyre of a truck was punctured by a policeman after they had beaten the man to a pulp. His phone and money were also collected by the police while his vehicle was also allegedly dented with bullets and sticks.”

In a related development, articulated vehicle drivers yesterday blocked all roads in and out of Bida town in Niger State, causing road users travelling to Abuja, Lagos and other destinations to suspend their journeys as there was no alternative route.

The drivers used their vehicles to block the roads while protesting the blockage of Bida/Minna road by the Niger State government due to ongoing rehabilitation works on the road.

They insisted that until the state government reopened Bida/Minna road, they would not remove their vehicles.

Malam Abdullahi Mohammed, a tanker driver told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that blocking the road by the state government for the past six months had worsened the already bad Bida/Lapai/Lambata road, which they had used as an alternative route.

“The Bida/Lapai/Lambata road is completely bad right now. We sleep there for two or three days before getting to our destinations,” he said.