Amid controversy trailing the operations of its agency, the Lagos State Parking Authority (LASPA), the Lagos State government on Wednesday said the development was designed to eliminate indiscriminate parking and collection of levies in the metropolis.
It would be recalled that a post had recently gone viral on social media, stating that LASPA issued a letter signed by its General Manager, levying a Lekki-based company a total sum of N290,000 for the parking lot outside their premises.
In a bid to set the records straight on the activities of the newly created agency, LASPA, the Lagos State Commissioner for Transportation, Dr. Frederick Oladeinde at a press briefing said against, “The erroneous claims of certain individuals and groups, LASPA has the power by law to collect park levies.
“As it is usually the case, especially in a political season, political jobbers and people with limited knowledge on the constitutional mandates of LASPA have tried fruitlessly to exaggerate the issue by playing to the gallery.”
The commissioner who described the agency as, “a one stop authority, providing solutions to parking challenges across the state,” said the idea that informed the creation of the agency was to put an end to impediments arising from indiscriminate parking and collection of levies.
Highlighting the mandates of LASPA, he said “LASPA was created to find lasting solutions to the issues of indiscriminate and illegal parking across the state.”
This, according to him, “will aid prompt reduction of traffic gridlock experienced by everyone.
“The agency was established, among others, to promote parking policies tailored to suit the peculiarity of the state in line with modern international standards towards achieving a smart city,” he added.
According to him, the Agency was also empowered to remove all “impediments arising from indiscriminate parking on carriageways, thereby increasing the carriageway capacity on the roads, improving the flow of traffic and reducing travel time.”
Also speaking, the General Manager, LASPA, Mrs. Adebisi Adelabu, said the state government is moving to the level where every developer/builder must accommodate park provisions in their building plans before construction.
According to her, the agency has been engaging with religious organisations and businesses on the need to establish parks for their worshippers and customers.
She explained that the need to reorder indiscriminate collection of levies for parking was important to channel the funds into infrastructure to solve existing problems.
In his remarks, the state’s Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Gbenga Omotoso, said the claims that the government was to levy people for parking in their private residence was a craft of falsehood.
“It is not true, it is an attempt to malign the government by mischievous people. We are not surprised to see things like this because we are in the season of politics. When it comes to this kind of matter everybody seems to be an expert, everybody seems to be a lawyer,” he said.
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