By Fasalie Sulaiman Kamara
Commercial motor bike riders (Okada) on Monday took to the streets of Freetown protesting against police instructions that they should not ride within the Central Business District,(CBD), of Freetown.
The bike riders rode through Siaka Stevens Street to Up Gun in the east end of Freetown honking the horns of their bikes and demanding freedom to operate.
The protests comes in the backdrop of on-going engagement among parliament, the police, the Sierra Leone Road Safety Authority, (SLRSA), Office of National Security [ONS]and leaders of commercial transporters in a bid to come up with definitive answers that will address challenges in the transport sector.
Last week reports indicated that the police made a presentation to the lawmakers suggesting the banning of Okadas in the city. Okada is the major mode of transport in most part of Sierra Leone due to insufficient public transport facilities.
But the form of transport has also been blamed for many deaths in road accidents. Okada riders are also accused of lawlessness.
But the riders say the fact that they are licenced means they should be allowed to operate unhindered.
Hassan Turay, one of the protesters on Monday, said: “We need freedom. Our motor bikes are licensed and insured yet; we are not allowed to ride in town.”
Efforts to control the bike riders had been on for a long time. A previous arrangement allowed the riders to ply only designated areas, including the hill sides, away from the CBD.
“The competition on the hill side roads is great” argued Hassan Turay, nothing that they are getting little sum of money from riding in this part of the city. His fellow cyclist, Alpha Amadu Jalloh, complained that they are tired of police harassment on the streets. “Police are coming up with all sorts of operations to suppress us. They have arrested several of our colleagues as a result of these operations,” he said.
“We need freedom. The police say we should not come to town. It is unfair,” Jalloh added. He said it’s not their fault entirely as bike riders for coming to the Central Business District. Passengers normally take them to town and, when they come, they are arrested by the police. “Bike riding is the only source of livelihood for us,” he stressed.
Mohamed Kamara, a business man in the Central Business District of Freetown, said the contributions of commercial motor cyclists are huge to their businesses. “I usually take commercial motor bike as a result of traffic congestion in town and it helps in running my businesses fast,” Kamara said.
“I don’t know what the real problems are between the police and the commercial motor bike riders. However, there is no point licensing the bikes if they are restricted from coming to town,” he added.
Brima Kamara, the head of police media, in an interview with Politico described the protests by the bikes rider as a demonstration of their penchant for “lawlessness, indiscipline” and lack of disregard for established authorities. He said the decision to stop the bikes from entering the city center had been reached jointly with leaders of the bike riders’ union. He said they held a meeting with the chairmen of the various representative unions of the motor bike riders in the Western Area and agreed that they should stop plying the CBD on or before the April 15.
“The reason is that we want to allow the ongoing engagement with parliament to continue. Whatever decision reached will be definitive. Parliament wants to design a code of ethics that will regulate the transport sector,” he explained, nothing that the arrest made yesterday morning was part of their normal traffic routine checks as police officers.
(C) Politico 19/04/16
