The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) has insisted on the enforcement of the installation and usage of speed limit devices in vehicles by drivers to reduce speed on the highway.

This follows the non-adherence to this directive by most motorists who had stopped installing the devices in their vehicles.

According to a report from the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), this disclosure was made by the Unit Commander of FRSC in Ore, Mr Olusegun Aladenika, in Ore, Ondo State, on Wednesday.

Aladenika said that most motorists on the Ore-Benin Expressway had stopped installing the devices in their vehicles.

While reminding motorists that the FRSC is still enforcing the installation of speed limits on vehicles and usage by drivers, the FRSC top official said that the devices were to reduce speed on the highway in order to check road crashes that often resulted to loss of lives and property.

What the FRSC top official is saying

Aladenika said, “Installing the speed limit devices by motorists in their vehicles to reduce speed on the highway is still very much in force. Motorists must not jettison the installation of the devices in their vehicles because they are good for both drivers and their passengers.

“It will reduce the speed of the vehicle in transit on the highway thereby reducing road crashes and loss of lives and properties,” he said.

Aladenika warned that any defaulting motorists caught driving above the speed limit would be arrested and punished accordingly.

He also urged them to patronise the appropriately registered organisations saddled with the responsibilities of issuing the devices to motorists adding that FRSC was neither a registered body nor given the approval to install the devices but only enforces its default.

What you should know

• It can be recalled that the FRSC, in 2016, announced the introduction of the use of speed limit devices in vehicles to reduce the incidents of accidents and loss of lives.
• However, the enforcement and compliance with the installation began on February 1, 2017, with articulated trucks.
• Following an appreciable level of compliance by commercial vehicles, the FRSC in 2019, said that it would soon begin the enforcement of speed limit devices installation on private vehicles.

The Lagos State Government has moved against individuals and groups that indiscriminately convert their buildings from residential to commercial as they commence the restoring of Government Residential Schemes to their original plans.

The week-long monitoring and enforcement exercise is to be carried out in the Lekki Peninsula Scheme I and Magodo Residential Schemes I and II.

This disclosure was made by the Lagos State Commissioner for Physical Planning and Urban Development, Dr Idris Salako, on Tuesday, March 2, 2021, in Alausa.

Salako stated that Government Schemes ought to remain residential with provision for services as planned but the schemes had been bastardised by indiscriminate conversion of buildings from residential to commercial by some of the residents.

He added that if the pervasive lawlessness in these Estates were allowed to go on, the future would spell doom for the carefully designed upper-income residential schemes, noting that well-meaning residents had inundated the State Government with complaints and sought redress of the untoward situation.

Salako recalled that the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development had extensively engaged and dialogued with residents of the Estates with a view to righting the wrongs.

He said, “It is noteworthy that engagements with Magodo Phases I and II Residents Association produced the Revised Magodo Scheme I and II, which has since become effective.”

The Commissioner warned that indiscriminate conversion of Government Schemes from Residential to Commercial would not be tolerated in Lagos State and urged those liable for any unlawful conversion to brace up for the Ministry’s enforcement activities.

He said, “Our Monitoring and Enforcement team will be visiting all other Government Schemes for similar action in due course. I, hereby, urge that every part of the State should take a cue from the planned enforcement by desisting from the undue conversion of property without the approval of the appropriate authorities.”

What you should know

• The Lagos State Government had in the past clamped down on property owners who illegally convert their residential buildings to commercial purposes especially in locations like Ikeja, Victoria Island and so on.
• While warning building owners against the unauthorized conversion of properties for commercial purposes, the state government pointed out that under the state’s physical planning law, a residential property owner must obtain a due permit before it can convert such building for commercial purposes.
• This practice has seen hitherto purely residential areas turn into commercial with the presence of businesses.

LASG has restated its commitment to restoring Government Residential Schemes to their original plans with the commencement of week-long monitoring and enforcement exercise in Lekki Peninsula Scheme I and Magodo Residential Schemes I and II.@jidesanwoolu @idreezsalako#LASG pic.twitter.com/izkJwIc9ms

— The Lagos State Govt (@followlasg) March 3, 2021