Lawmakers Investigate Alleged Disappearance of FG’s Transit Buses in FCT

Udora Orizu

The House of Representatives has mandated its Committee on Federal Capital Territory to investigate the alleged disappearance of transit buses provided by the Federal Government for Transport Services within the Federal Capital Territory to recover them.

The resolution of the lawmakers followed the adoption of a motion sponsored by Hon. Ikenna Elezieanya, at yesterday’s plenary.

Moving the motion, Elezieanya noted that the provision of the buses in Abuja, apart from creating jobs and generating revenue, was targeted at alleviating the sufferings of the citizens as it was designed to ease the commuting challenges of civil and public servants to and from their offices to ensure effective discharge of their duties.

He also noted that between 2003 to 2007, 5,000 buses were provided by the government to assist and complement the efforts of government workers in accessing their various offices within the Federal Capital Territory.

The lawmaker expressed concerns that all the buses, amounting to 10,000 provided by the government were gradually disappearing from the roads and not being effectively managed by the FCT administration and as such, not achieving its core objective, which is alleviating the transport challenges of the masses.

He said, “Further notes that between 2010 to 2014, the federal government, in a bid to effectively improve public service delivery in line with global best practices, provided an additional 5,000 buses for the transportation of civil servants.

“Also concerned that the citizens who are denied these services are daily faced with the risk of riding in commercial vehicles operated by kidnappers, armed robbers and bandits;

cognisant of the need to recover the buses and make them operational to serve the core objectives for which they were provided.”

Adopting the motion, the House gave the Committee three weeks to carryout the assignment and report back for further legislative action.