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…As 296 out of 305 arrested motorists fail psychological test
The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) said on Thursday that its ongoing mental stability and psychological evaluation of traffic law offenders, tagged Operation Cobra, is not a psychiatric test, stressing that the Corps did not intend to do so in the near future. The Corps Marshal, FRSC, Boboye Oyeyemi, made the clarification while speaking at the national workshop organised by the Corps for driving school operators in the country.
Oyeyemi was reacting to media reports, which described the mental evaluation exercise as a psychiatric test, with some stakeholders, especially psychiatrists, denouncing the policy as “reckless and embarrassing’’.
He, however, reiterated the commitment of the FRSC to enforcing the new policy of subjecting life-threatening traffic law offenders to psychological test.
According to him, the actions of such violators were a deviation from the true nature of Nigerians as a “cultured, disciplined and enterprising people who have faith in life and those of others’’.
He said the agency could not shy away from its responsibility of checking the lawlessness of road users, adding that the exercise had reached a point of no return.
The Corps, according to him, is working with the Federal Ministry of Justice and the Nigeria Psychological Association to ensure fairness in the dispensation of justice during the exercise.
The clarification came on a day FRSC disclosed that it had arrested 305 motorists for 345 life-threatening traffic offences since the launch of its Operation Cobra on July 1.
Oyeyemi, who disclosed this in Abuja, said only nine of the arrested offenders passed the psychological test administered on them.
This, according to him, means that their actions were as a result of a willful violation of regulations.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Operation Cobra is a new road safety enforcement policy of the FRSC designed to subject violators of certain traffic offences to mental stability evaluation.
The offences are the use of the phone while driving, route violation, traffic light violation, dangerous driving and overloading.
Oyeyemi said the policy was in response to rising incidence of the identified offences, adding that investigating the mental stability of violators would help to check the trend.
Source: NAN
