The Commander and Chief Executive Officer, Ogun State Traffic Compliance and Enforcement Agency (TRACE), Cdr. ‘Seni Ogunyemi has clarified that it is illegal to block roads for social parties in the State.
Cdr. Ogunyemi who made the clarification on a radio programme in Abeokuta, explained that local and state governments only give permit to organise social events and not to block roads for other people’s usage.
He stressed that it was imperative to curb such lawless behaviour through continuous public enlightenment, pointing out that TRACE officers do more of sensitisation than enforcement, as well as counselling offenders through corrective measures for them to see reasons not to commit the same offence again.
“It is illegal to block roads for social parties under section six and seven of the Law which established TRACE. The problem is lawlessness on the part of the people. They always say that they got permits from local governments but they do not know that it is only to organise social parties and not blocking public roads. TRACE must be involved too, in order to have free flow of traffic at such social gatherings”, he said.
The TRACE boss added that the agency was not established purposely to generate revenue but because of offenders’ negligence, who were referred to other agencies such as Ministry of Health for psychiatric evaluation, Internal Revenue Service for tax payment among others, in order to generate revenue for government for the development of the state.
Cdr. Ogunyemi also informed that TRACE was empowered to serve on all roads such as, Trunks B and C roads which fall under the state governments, as well as Trunk A which are Federal roads that link other states, while same applies to Trunk F roads which are also Federal roads within state roads, to support crash and accident victims.
He said checking vehicle documents falls within the Agency’s purview, while ‘stop and search’ is outside their jurisdiction, pointing out that his officers and men were professionals, highly trained to work day and night.
The Commander advised motorists in the State to always plan their journey, manage their time well and not be in haste, use seat belt, avoid making calls while driving, as well as obey traffic laws of the state.
