Men of the Oyo State Road Traffic Management Authority (OYRTMA) led by Akin Fagbemi on Friday were caught receiving fines from motorists and motorcyclists into a private bank account.
SaharaReporters learnt that the agency had allegedly turned the agency into a money-making venture for the government and a private company.
SaharaReporters was told that any motorist apprehended for any infraction, whether minor or major, would be forced to pay into the accounts of a private company and the government.
But the confirmation of the amount paid into the government account would have to be verified at the Office of the Accountant-General of the state, while the teller for the payment of fine to the private account would not be confirmed by the Office of the Accountant-General, but by the OYRTMA officers themselves.
The details of the private account are: Reliable Auto-Services, Zenith Bank, with account number 1016751601, apart from official bank accounts of the government in different banks.
Speaking with SaharaReporters, a journalist who was arrested by OYTMA officials for minor infraction, Arisekola Ojo, said, “I was coming from Bashorun, going towards Iwo Road. A truck was going in front of me. I followed it to the Idi-Ape Junction. With the truck in front of me, I could only see the green arrow from the traffic light that passed the vehicles going towards Iwo-Road, but I could not see the counting board.
"Immediately I drove slowly on the Zebra crossing, I noticed that the red light was on; counting down from 100. I saw it when it was 99 and I stopped immediately. The back tyres were still on the Zebra crossing. I stopped on my own volition, despite the fact that the truck did not stop. The OYRTMA official came and arrested me. They took me to their mini-office, known as Water Station, opposite Eid Prayer Ground, Agodi area.
"They collected my car keys and anyone that did not surrender the car keys to them would have his or her tires deflated. So, I surrendered the keys to them. One of them pasted a sticker on the windscreen of the car that it had been impounded. They wrote two tickets for me; one was for parents to the government and the other one was for payment into a private account. The forms stated that N10,000 should be paid into the account of the government, while N5,000 was for the private account mentioned earlier.
"What I have observed is that the OYRTMA was more concerned about revenues it wanted to generate for the government and the one that would be paid into the private account that was not known to the government. Even if that account belonged to a consultant to the government, it should be the government that would pay them.
“OYRTMA is not supposed to be collecting government revenue into a private company account. I was also asked to pay N500 by hand for the sticker pasted on the car, which depicted that the vehicle was impounded.”
The Chairman of OYRTMA in the state, Akin Fagbemi, could not be reached on his mobile phone to react to the collection of government revenue into a private company's account.
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