LAGOS - The National President of the Road Transport Employers’ Association of Nigeria (RTEAN) today said that levies being collected by its members and its sister organisation NURTW were legal.

Mr. Olufemi Ajewole, said that collections at motor parks nationwide by the two Federal Government-approved trade unions were legal and constitutional.

Ajewole told newsmen in Lagos that the two trade unions were the only ones approved to operate nationwide in the transport sector.

“The National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW), is made up of workers and drivers, while RTEAN members are their employers,” he said.

The RTEAN President said both unions were empowered to generate revenues at motor parks for the maintenance of the parks and other union needs.

He said the unions did not get subventions from the Federal Government.

Ajewole claimed that funds generated by the unions through the parks were accounted for to the Federal Ministry of Labour and Productivity.

He said that members collecting the levies were required to be in uniform, with approved chapter badges and codes for every chapel attached to the uniforms.

Ajewole explained that before now, fines were a penalty, with a jail term of six months’
imprisonment without an option of a fine on any illegal collector caught by the Motor Park Monitoring Committee.

“This, however, had to be abrogated when it was found not to be helping the issue,” he added.
Ajewole said that the Ministry of Transportation now had a Task Force monitoring all illegal extortion to prosecute any culprit.

He, however, attributed the growing menace of illegal collections to the high unemployment rate in the country.