Abuja residents have decried the ban of unpainted taxis operating within the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, by the Transport Secretariat.
Mr Tochukwu Ikuazum, a public servant, said, yesterday, that workers would be stranded after close of work without unpainted taxis.

*Abuja commercial buses

“After closing hours, it is always the civil servants who use their vehicles to convey workers especially along the Nyanya-Mararraba axis.
The number of painted taxis in the FCT is not enough to convey workers during rush hours,’’ he said. Mr John Isaac, also a civil servant, who lives at one of the estates in the FCT, said painted taxis were not allowed into the estate.

Isaac advised that the FCT transport authority should advise estate owners to allow taxis into their premises.

“Painted taxis are not allowed to enter the estate where I leave so it will be difficult to pay for what will not provide complete services.
Painted tax will only drop me at the gate which is some distance to my house. I know the ban is for our own good but the authority need to address lot of issues like that of the estates and also provide enough taxis to convey people,’’ he said.

Ms Janet Nwachukwu, a self employed lady, said major hotels in the FCT does not allow painted taxis into their premises. Nwachukwu said the FCT transport authority should meet with hotel owners to address the issue of painted taxis not been allowed into enter their premises.

He said: “If you pay N300 to a painted taxi driver to drive you to Nicon Luxury Hotels, the driver will only drop you at the gate due the hotel management policy of not allowing painted taxis into the premises.”

But unpainted taxis are allowed into the hotel premises that is the reason many people prefer to use unpainted taxis because they will take you into the premises with the same amount,’’ she said.

On October 1, 2014, deadline for the registration of unpainted commercial vehicles, also known as ‘kabu kabu’, the FCT Transport Secretariat started arresting defaulters on November 6. Mr Jonathan Ivoke, the Secretary, FCT Transportation Secretariat, said

“the use of illegal, unlicensed, unpainted, unauthorised andunidentified vehicles as taxi cabs and buses’’ in FCT was a trafficoffence.

Ivoke said that the FCT administration had told estate managers to allow only painted taxis to operate in their environs.
According to him, the secretariat had created five transit zones for effective enforcement and that it will monitor movement of vehicles in all the housing estates.

Ivoke added that the administration has enough commercial vehicles to service commuters in the FCT. He said that it was the duty of the government to protect the residents and to ensure that incidents of “one chance,” robbery and
abuse of passengers were prevented.

The secretary said that the FCT administration commenced a programme called replacement of rickety taxis in 2011 in order to phase out old taxi cabs.
He said the FCT minister has purchased 340 taxi cabs and havedistributed them to drivers belonging to licensed operators.