Vice President of Nigeria, Professor Yemi Osinbajo on Friday evening visited the Lagos House in Alausa Ikeja to convey the condolences of the Federal Government to the State Government on the tragic tanker explosion on Thursday at the Otedola Bridge which claimed lives and properties.
Osinbajo, who spoke shortly after a closed door meeting with the State Governor, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode, said the Federal Government was deeply saddened by the incident, saying that President Muhammadu Buhari had delegated him to visit the State to commiserate with the people of Lagos on the unfortunate incident.
“I am here to commiserate with the government and people of Lagos State on the tragedy that occurred just yesterday. It’s a very terrible thing and all of us were deeply saddened by it. Before Mr. President left this morning he asked me to express his sincere condolences to his Excellency and also to the people of the State. It’s a very deeply saddening event and we pray this sort of thing will never repeat itself.
“We also hope that all of those who have suffered injury will recover soon and we pray for comfort for those who lost their loved ones and properties in this very tragic event. That’s why am here.
Responding, Governor Ambode thanked the Vice President for finding time to visit to condole with the people of the State in this moment of grief, saying that it was a testament to the fact that the Federal Government was deeply concerned about the safety of lives and property of residents in the State.
“We just want to say a big thank you to President Muhammadu Buhari and also a big thank you to Mr. Vice President for finding out time to quickly commiserate with us in Lagos and also with the press statement of Mr. President who is not able to be here personally but has sent the Vice President, because they feel so strongly that this kind of incident is not what should be occurring in this time in Lagos and they feel so concerned that beyond the incident, if there are other remedies that we need to do, we have already discussed on those issues that we need to quickly put in place to make sure that we do not have such reoccurrence,” he said.
Governor Ambode also assured the Vice President that the situation had been brought under control and normalcy had been restored within the axis where the incident occurred, saying that all hands are on deck to prevent such incidents in future.
“Normalcy has come back to the city and we believe strongly that other measures will be put in place to make sure that things go on normally,” he said.
The Governor equally thanked his counterpart in Osun State, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola who was also at the Lagos House to express his condolences, while commiserating with all the families who lost their loved ones as well as properties in the inferno.
Speaking earlier, Aregbesola commiserated with the government and people of Lagos State, particularly those who lost their loved ones and properties to the tragedy, but said the incident called to question the need to revisit road worthiness certification for vehicles initiated by the Lagos State Government.
“Lagos initiated a process that we all refused to follow through because of the agitation of those who are affected and that process is the Ministry of Transport (MOT) Road Worthiness Certificate. We have to now ask again for our governments to revive the MOT certification of vehicles because if all vehicles are very road worthy, probably the dastardly accident of yesterday would have been avoided.
“Our sympathy can only be meaningful if we do the right thing to prevent such occurrence and so let us revive the spirit of ensuring road worthiness of vehicles on our roads particularly those ones that have capacity for mass destruction such as articulated vehicles,” Aregbesola said.
SIGNED
HABIB ARUNA
CHIEF PRESS SECRETARY
JUNE 29, 2018