The Federal Road Safety Commission has described as tissue of lies and misinformation a publication in a national newspaper in which the Secretary to the Katsina State Government, Alhaji Mustapha Inuwa, was quoted to have berated the corps for allegedly abandoning the vision and mission of its founding fathers.
In a statement on Thursday March 25, 2021, the Assistant Corps Marshal, Corps Public Education Officer, Bisi Kazeem, said the content of the publication is a total falsification of the statement made by the SSG during a courtesy visit by the Katsina State Sector Commander, Corps Commander Ali Sule Tanimu, to commiserate with (the SSG) on the fire incident that engulfed the Katsina Central market.
The statement reads: “The attention of the Federal Road Safety Corps has been drawn to a fabricated and fake statement credited to the Secretary to the Government of Katsina State, Alhaji Mustapha Inuwa, in a publication by one Agaju Madugba which was published in the Sun News of Tuesday, 24 March, 2021.
“The Corps wishes to emphatically state that the SSG did not berate the FRSC in any way possible as purportedly reported in the Sun newspaper; rather, he praised the Corps for standing tall from inception and admonished the Corps to intensify enforcement on some critical offences prevalent in the state.
“The highlight of the SSG’s statement during the visit that was later distorted is that he commended the operations of the Corps and stated that the FRSC has earned a lot of respect from the motoring public since inception; that he knows the corps is presently short of manpower and needs to employ more youths roaming the streets so as to beef up its operational activities and strengthen its enforcement base.”
He said the SSG also admonished the management of the Corps to intensify operations and enforcement on overloading of vehicles, rather than deploying a huge operational muscle on arresting seat belt use violators.
According to the statement, the Katsina SSG also noted the Corps needs more fund in order to achieve its statutory mandate, and suggested that the National Assembly should review the laws establishing the FRSC to see whether they can use a percentage of resources it generates through fines to fund aspects of its operations.
Mr Kazeem said it was unfortunate that the writer, in a single publication, attempted to dent an image that took the Corps more than three decades to build.
He restated the Corps’ commitment towards the realisation of its corporate mandate of eradicating road traffic crashes and creating a safer motoring environment in Nigeria “and will not be deterred or discouraged in whatever manner from saving lives on Nigerian roads through continuous deployment of strategic initiatives that could eradicate every menace of road traffic crashes on Nigerian roads.”
He said the organization is still on course and working assiduously towards the realisation of its corporate mandate as evidenced in the drastic reduction in road traffic crashes and improved driving culture through continual impactful public enlightenment campaigns of the Corps from inception to date.
“The Corps Marshal, Dr Boboye Oyeyemi, enjoins members of the public to disregard the falsehood inherent in the publication and the misinformation it has created in some sections of the social and mainstream media, groups and interests,” he said.