Christmas: Gridlock As Holiday Makers Groan In PH Traffic

Traffic gridlock yesterday paralysed both commercial and social activities in Port Harcourt and its environs as some residents scrambled to the countryside for the Christmas and New Year celebrations.

Our correspondent, who drove through some of the routes within and those leading out of the city of Port Harcourt, had a difficult time escaping from the terrible traffic gridlock on most of the routes.

For instance, the popular Port Harcourt-Aba Road, Ikwerre Road, East-West Road, Peter Odili-Slaughter-Woji-Elelenwo Road, Garrison-Trans Amadi-Slaughter Road, Stadium-G.U.Ake-Airport Road, Rumuola-Rumuokwuta-Choba Road, Rumuokoro-Rukpokwu-Airport Road, Artillery-Old Aba Road, and Rumuomasi-Elekahia Road, among others, were jammed, with commercial motorists spending several hours to make a return trip.

In some instances, journeys of less than 10-20minutes took more than 2 hours 30minutes, while journeys that hitherto took 30-40minutes, got passengers groaning for between 3 and 4hours or more.

Most of the residents, who were travelling outside the state capital, also spent hours in the unprecedented gridlock that permeated almost all the roads.

At most of the motor parks, thousands of travelers were seen boarding vehicles to their various destinations while a large number could not secure available vehicles to make their trips, and therefore, were stranded at the parks.

From the popular Abali Park, Mile 3 Park, Agofure, God Is Good, Cross Country, Rivers Transport Company (RTC), Imo Transport Company (|ITC), Bob Izua Motors, as well as the many luxury bus terminals, passengers were seen hustling to procure their tickets to enable them travel for the Christmas and New Year festivities.

Our correspondent discovered that apart from operators of commercial vehicles on intra-city transport services, others on inter-state transport system also increased their fares astronomically by over 100 per cent.

The Tide further learnt that the hike in fares affected some travelers, who lamented their inability to address all the challenges they had budgeted to settle before the end of the year owing to the unexpected increase in transport fares.

The filling stations were also seen dispensing petroleum products, with few queues noticed at very popular filling stations, especially those along the very busy roads leading out of the city of Port Harcourt.

But even so, the filling stations still sold products at official pump price, with only those buying products with jerry cans paying a little above approved rates.

Apart from the swift increase in transport fares, business activities also witnessed a significant boost in most areas, especially those selling foodstuff and other consumables, as well as gift items.

In some of the markets in Port Harcourt, especially Mile 1 and Mile 3, Creek Road, Town, and the various supermarkets such as Park ‘N’ Shop, Charai’s, Everyday Group, De Giant, Cash ‘N’ Carry, residents were busy shopping to make their Christmas merry.

Following the last minutes rush, prices of goods and services, foodstuff and live birds, including chicken and turkey, gift items, and other consumables have skyrocketed to the rooftops, with the buoyant and wealthy easily procuring the things they need while the average Nigerian is finding it difficult to afford few things for the family.

The financial institutions such as banks also witnessed last minutes rush, with some running out of cash even before midday yesterday.

A cross section of residents, who spoke with The Tide on the situation, described the traffic gridlock as horrible, suffocating and excruciating.

They complained that the poor traffic situation has made it difficult for people to get out of the city to the countryside for the Christmas festival.

Some, who were stranded in the banks, also complained of poor network to enable them utilize the services of the Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), which were either not dispensing cash or were completely not functioning.

Some of the customers further complained that their inability to get cash for their Christmas celebrations was as a result of banks’ restriction of cash withdrawals, even as their ATMs were not working.

The Tide correspondent who visited some branches of the banks, including Fidelity Bank, UBA Plc, First Bank, Union Bank, GTBank, Access Bank, IBTC-Chartered Bank, SpringBank, SkyeBank, among others, saw large number of their customers complaining of their inability to withdraw cash for the Christmas, as according to them, the banks declined to honour their requests for money on the excuse that they had no money to meet customers’ demands.

Chinedu Okoye told The Tide at the Olu Obasanjo branch of Diamond Bank that the heavy traffic was caused by people not willing to travel out of the city early enough for the festivities.

According to him, “if people had travelled out before today (Tuesday), the situation would have been less chaotic”.

Also speaking, Ekanem Udoh, condemned the attitude of banks for restricting withdrawals from ATMs, noting that this situation would affect those wishing to travel out.

A security operative in one of the banks at Olu Obasanjo Road, however, urged the people to blame the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for limiting the amount of money a customer can withdraw at a time.

Men processing chicken for Christmas at Wuse Market in Abuja, yesterday.