The Oyo State Government has begun the registration of commercial motorcycle riders, popularly known as okada riders.
Executive Assistant to Governor Seyi Makinde on Administration and General Services, Idowu Ogedengbe, revealed this.
Ogedengbe made this known on Monday when he featured on the interview platform of the Oyo State Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists: Guests’ Forum at the chapel’s secretariat in Mokola, Ibadan.
He said over 5,000 okada riders had been registered.
He said this following the ban on okada in many parts of Lagos State, there had been an influx into the state.
He said any commercial motorcycle rider that fails to register would face the wrath of the law as the Oyo State Road Transport Management Agency has been directed to apprehend those that have refused to register.
Rev. Ogedengbe said: “The Ministry of Works and Public Transport is working in consonance with the Management Information Centre of the Oyo State Government to embark on a programme of registering and regulating all okada riders in Oyo State.
“If you are using your okada for commercial business, we want to have your details in our database.
“We will capture the chassis and number of that okada.
“We will get the phone number and pictures of that okada owner, and even that of the rider.
“If any of them commits any offence or crime, we will be able to track them down.
“We are also concluding plans to kit them up with jackets.
“We have already given out the first contract and a total of 5,000 okada riders are already captured on that database.
“According to our governor, we are a government that depends on data, science and logic.
“We don’t just want to make a decision without first critically examining it, and looking at it empirically.
“We all know that the okada business is a means of livelihood for some of our people.
“If we ban it outright, it will affect a lot of household income.
“What we want to achieve with this is to reduce the security threat that those people riding on motorcycles could bring upon our state.
“We don’t want to do it in a way that we will impinge on the rights of any law-abiding okada rider, going about with his means of livelihood.
“Just like it happened in the United States of America recently where commercial motorcycles were crushed for violating the state laws, we shall also get there if it is established that any of the okada riders in this state violates our state laws.
“Any criminal elements among them shall be purged.
“So, if you are coming to Oyo State and you don’t have our registration, it is an immediate pointer that OYRTMA will spot you and arrest you because they would have known that you are not meant to be here.
“With that, before you even commit the crime, we have arrested you.
“We are going to pursue that aggressively.”