News and Events

HELMET ENFORCEMENT: IRATE OKADA OPERATORS RAZE FRSC OFFICE IN BIU

The Biu Unit Command Office of the Federal Road Safety Corps was in the early hours of today, set ablaze by a mob of commercial motorcycle operators who were protesting the killing of their two colleagues.

Details of the tragic incident indicate that the Biu Unit Command of the FRSC had in pursuant to on-going nationwide enforcement of compulsory use of safety helmet, organized a joint special patrol tagged ‘Operation Compliance’ in collaboration with the Police, Nigerian Army and the National Security and Civil Defence Corps as part of measures aimed at checking the spate of violation of the directive on helmet use among okada operators in the area.

According to the acting Unit Commander, Apollos Movel, in the course of the exercise which was endorsed by the Motorcycle operators leadership in Biu Local Government in Borno State, 17 motorcycles were impounded for non-compliance which sparked-off a protest from Okada riders.

Further information indicate that the commercial motorcycle operators snatched and destroyed helmets belonging to their complying colleagues before pelting the ‘operation Flush’ team from the Nigerian Army with stones and other dangerous weapons.

In an attempt to disperse the rampaging crowd, stray bullets hit two of the Okada operators which resulted for a more intense protest from the motorcycle operators which spread into the metropolis.

The Unit Commander added that the mob took the corpses of their dead colleagues to the palace of the Emir of Biu, Alhaji Aliu Mustapha in further protest before rushing to raze the FRSC building and a Police Out-station to the ground, forcing FRSC Officers and Men in the area to relocate to the Abogo Lagema Military Cantonment to avoid further reprisals from the rampaging okada operators.