Following reports linking some tricycle operators to criminal activities in Osun state, the government has directed commercial tricycle operators to ensure they have valid documents for operations or face penalty.
Unregistered tricycles are therefore prohibited to operate in the state, with the warning that anyone caught using a tricycle with no proper documents would be held for committing traffic offences.
The government also, in the statement by the Special Adviser to the Governor on Transportation, Mr Yakubu Adejare, urged the tricycle operators to ensure they get documents such as hackney permits, roadworthiness, as well as, vehicle licences before they start operating in the state.
Adejare’s statement published in the bulletin of the State Ministry of Information and Public Enlightenment in Osogbo on Wednesday further read, “We have recently discovered that a lot of tricycle operators in Osun State are on the roads without necessary documents. It is regarded as a traffic offence henceforth.
“All tricycle operators must ensure they get necessary documents before they hit the road with their automobiles. Men of OTRAM and the VIO officials will begin to do a stop-and-search operation soon.
“Tricycles are being used to perpetrate evil by men of the underworld; any operator that refuses to get the particulars will henceforth be regarded as an agent of evil.”