ACTIVITIES OF THE STREET URCHINS IN MOUAU PARK GETTING OUT OF HAND

The management of MOUAU built a bus-stop because of the menaced and careless parking of buses on the road which stop to pick up passengers on the narrow lane. The event of which has led to accidents, knock-downs and other road-related hazards. The danger was drastically reduced when the park was established.

But the good works of the school’s management has been jeopardized by the touts operating in the park which has led to the students and passers-by asking if there are no monitoring bodies to control their activities, as there have been recent reports of fighting, either between the touts and the bus drivers or between the touts themselves.

An incident took place in the bus park on Friday the 18^th of July 2014 that threw both students and other people in shock, as a tout who had a misapprehension with one of the bus drivers due to park levy, struggled with the bus driver for his bus key while the vehicle was in motion and at the middle of the ever busy Ikot-Ekpene road which led to the passengers especially the MOUAU students and some post UTME students screaming for their dear lives. The bus driver seemed to gain the upper hand in the tussle, leaving the tout with no other option than to break the front glass of the bus, causing the passengers to sustain severe injuries. The reason for establishing the bus park has been defeated, because the commuters (students, staff and the community at large) has lost the flair of riding, and now hold their hearts in their hands with every trip made. The continuous rise of the fares contribute to these discomfort. But with all these unholy events taking place, the commuters have little or no say in the matter, since the authorities have refused to look into it.