About 500 passengers were stranded on Sunday at the Young Shall Grow Transport Company in Lagos.
The passengers had gone to the transport company, located at Maza Maza area on the busy Old Ojo Road, to board the company’s coaster buses to various states in the country.
But the passengers got the shocker of their lives when staff of the company allegedly failed to provide buses after they collected the fares.
One of the passengers, Okechukwu Nwokolo, said he went with his family of four to the Young Shall Grow Park as early as 7am and bought four tickets at the cost of N7,050 per person to travel to Anambra State for Christmas.
Nwokolo said: “The park was swarming with hundreds of other passengers, many of whom were with two months to three months old babies, standing under the sun after they have all paid same fare to the company staff to travel to the eastern part of the country.
“But, alas, all the staff of the transport company disappeared, with no buses to convey passengers and no staff of the company was around to explain anything to the many passengers stranded and crying, having paid for multiple tickets for many family members.
“It was after eight hours that two of the company’s staff came and they gave us a rickety vehicle to convey people.
“I refused to join the bus because they have collected fare for air conditioned bus but they brought a rickety bus with no air condition.”
The stranded passengers said they appealed that their fares be returned but the transport company refused and made them to travel in the rickety bus.
Another Lagosian, who was to travel with his family and simply identified himself as Mr. Churchill, said: “I don’t know what to say but my family travelled in that rickety vehicle they later provided after waiting more that eight hours.
“We got to the park by 5am but my family left by 2.30pm in that rickety vehicle because they refused to refund the money they collected.
“They said the stranded passengers had no choice that they can sell the tickets to someone else or they enter the bus.
“It was a terrible experience.
“People were stranded in the sun because there was no shelter or chairs to sit.
“Children were crying but these people did not care.
“I could not travel because the vehicles were not just only bad but were not enough to convey all the stranded.
“I am praying that my family gets home safely.”
In a related development, travellers to Benue State and other parts of the northern part of the country experienced hellish gridlock at the weekend.
The passengers attributed the gridlock to the bad roads and heavy vehicular movement as hundred of travellers made last minute moves to get to their villages for the Christmas festivities.
One of the passengers, Elizabeth, said: “We left Lagos about 8.30am but we did not get to Benue State until about 11.30pm. It was a snail movement on the road as major roads were bad and filled with pot holes.
“The road from Akpa to Otukpo was the worst.
“Government need to repair all the bad roads.”
It was also a sad experience for travellers to Anambra and Imo States as they claimed armed robbers waylaid travellers on the routes to Onitsha, a busy town in Anambra State.
The Federal Road Safety Commission equally complained about the attitude of motorists on the Lokoja-Abuja Road, especially at Abaji.
Many of them were reported to have driven against traffic, leading to chaos on the ever busy road.
At the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, 4,664 passengers were said to have travelled on Friday.
The Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria said the passage of the passengers was smooth.
FAAN said the 4,664 figure was the highest number recorded in 2012.
The statement by FAAN added: “This high passenger flow was efficiently processed by the staff of Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria who provided the enabling infrastructure.
“The timely intervention of the Minister of Aviation fast-tracked the passenger processing formalities, which was stretched to its limits.
“Additional cooling system was also mobilised to respond to the overstretched cooling system.
“The ‘E’ Arrival Wing which is undergoing reconstruction had to be opened to passengers to ease congestion and enable passenger comfort.
“The ‘E’ Arrival Wing of the Murtala Mohammed International Airport is part of the airport reconstruction and remodelling project being undertaken by the Minister of Aviation, Princess Stella Oduah.
“Eleven airports across the country are being remodelled in the first phase while another eleven will be remodelled in the second phase.”
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