Commercial tricycle operators in Aba have vowed to oppose the directives of the leadership of the association; Abia State Amalgamated Tricycle Operators Association (ASATOA) banning them from pasting posters of their preferred candidates for 2019 elections on their tricycles.
Mr. Eugene Job, the Chairman ASATOA, Aba zone had through a radio announcement banned pasting of campaign posters on tricycles within Aba and if they should do, must get the approval of the leadership of the union.
But this did not go well with members of ASATOA who said that they would resist any attempt by its leadership to cage them from exercising their right to choose and support any candidate of their choice.
However, ASATOA chairman in a telephone interview stated that members of the union have no reason to complain about the directives from the leadership under whose umbrella they (commercial tricycle operators) operates.
In his words: “If you are my member, you registered with me, I will give you directive. There things you don’t do. The union is not a political organization. Anybody that wants to paste posters on Keke must get clearance from the union.”
He said that they should come to him and complain if they think he was wrong in banning the pasting of campaign posters on their tricycles.
Some of the members who spoke to our reporter on Thursday accused the ASATOA leadership of running the union as their personal enterprise, denied entering into any agreement with the union not to paste posters of their preferred candidates on their tricycle.
They said they were neither carried along nor were they present in any meeting where such a thing was decided.
One of the tricycle operators who gave his name as Onyekwere Victor said “We had no such decision collectively because for a long time, the tricycle operators have not had any meeting in Aba at which we took a collective decision.
“There was no meeting like that between tricycle operators and our so-called leaders. If there was any such decision, it was an individual or group of individuals not the tricycle operators themselves.
“You can see PDP poster on my tricycle. That is an individual choice. There was no meeting like that. If every tricycle operator was invited to the meeting, we would have known that such a decision was taken.
We would have had the opportunity to tell Eugene face-to-face that we are adults and have the right to chose who to vote and not to vote for as guaranteed by the constitution. The earlier he (Job) realized that he is dealing with adults and not his kids at home, the better for him.”
Victor added that if the leader said such a thing, he has a motive for saying so and that only him knows what he wants to achieve.
He stressed that it was not a rational decision noting that if politicians go to the union to get permission to paste campaign posters on his tricycle, unless the persons paid him, he would not allow it.
“If such persons did not pay me too, I will not allow them to paste their poster on my tricycle because, it is not the union that bought the tricycle for me”, he said.
Another operator, Ikechukwu Emedo said he was not aware of the ban stressing ban by the union is anti members and is not good at all.
His words, “I do not know about the announcement. I am just hearing it for the first time. If they are saying this, then the task force they have set up is for themselves.
“I do not know about it and it is not our collective decision and it does not concern me.”
Also speaking, Gad Ebere who is also an operator of Keke in the city said it is not harmful for them to paste campaign posters on their own tricycles because it is not against the law.
He said, “But if the union is giving it coloration, we do not know. We will abide because we are under them. We are forced to be under them. We do not get any benefit from the union”, he said.
The Commissioner for Transport in Abia State, Chief Kingsley Imaga said that such order from ASATOA’s leadership did not have the approval of the state government or ministry of transport under whose ministry the tricycle union is reporting to.
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Imaga denied government’s involvement and said that the decision to ban the pasting of campaign posters on Tricycles in Aba was taken by the tricycle operators.
