Lagos State Police Command has issued seven days ultimatum to owners and operators of unregistered vehicles in Lagos State to register their vehicles or face the full weight of the law.
Also affected are vehicles with covered or defaced number plates, vehicles with fake number plates and vehicles without number plates.
The warning was announced in a statement issued by the spokesman of the Lagos Police Command, DSP Bala Elkana.
The police said users of number plates with special inscriptions like ‘Chief’ ‘Chairman’ ‘Ambassador’ ‘Baale’ ‘Iya loja’ ‘Sarki’ or bearing personal names among others were required by law to register such customized number plates.
The police stated that escort vehicles and bullion vans must also be registered.
The statement reads further: “It is not enough to inscribe just the word ‘Escort’ or ‘Pilot ‘as it is not sufficient enough to track such vehicle. Vehicles displayed for sale in various car stands must have the dealer’s sticker conspicuously pasted for easy identification.
The statement reads in part: “The Commissioner of Police Lagos State, CP Hakeem Odumosu psc has set up a Special Operations to clampdown on violators of traffic laws and to embark on massive enforcement at the expiration of the seven days ultimatum.
“The ultimatum will start from 6th January, 2020 and elapse by 11.59 p.m. on 12th January, 2020. The massive clampdown begins on 13th January, 2020 until sanity is restored to our roads.
“This enforcement becomes necessary considering the fact that criminal elements in recent past have devised a means of operating with such vehicles to attack unsuspecting members of the public without any trace.
“A recent example was a case that occurred at Allen Avenue, Ikeja, where an operator of bureau-de-change was attacked, robbed and murdered by a criminal gang that used an unregistered vehicle, making it difficult for detectives to track the vehicle.
“For the avoidance of doubt, Section 4(1) of the Road Traffic Act, Cap 548 prohibited the use of unregistered, unlicensed and unmarked vehicles. Any person who forges or fraudulently defaces, alters, mutilates or adds anything to a license or identification mark or uses on one vehicle a license or identification mark belonging to another vehicle is guilty of an offence under Section 32 of the Act. See also the provisions of Lagos State Traffic Law for various offences.
“Traffic violators will instantly be arraigned before Lagos State Special Offences Mobile Court.”
