WorldStage Newsonline-- In order to provide succour to drivers of heavy duty dry cargo trucks who are often sadly involved in accidents leading to serious injury or in some cases, their death, Standard Alliance Insurance Plc, Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO) and the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW), Monday said they had flagged off a health insurance scheme for members of the two unions at a ceremony in Obajana, Kogi State.

Flagging off the project tagged NARTO/NURTW Dry Cargo Truck Drivers’ Accident Health Insurance Scheme, Kassim Ibrahim Bataiya, National President of NARTO, explained that the event was the “crowning glory of a project conceived between the two organizations over two years ago and designed to benefit both the owners and the drivers of the heavy duty dry cargo trucks that ply the Nigerian roads on daily basis.”

Justifying the project, Bataiya said “the annual statistics provided by the Federal Road Safety Commission on the rates of accidents on our roads and the resultant serious injuries and deaths create the urgency for this scheme.”

According to him, “sadly enough, prior to this moment, in the event of any such accident, the affected driver or his mate as the case may be, was left to his fate with no financial reprieve extended to either of them in case of injury or to their families in case of death, thus the necessary motivation needed to spur them for greater productivity was lacking.”

He explained that the above gave rise to “the resolve of the two unions in partnership with our consultants: Standard Alliance Insurance Plc and Generationext, to pursue this insurance scheme aimed at providing financial succour and reprieve to the injured and to the family of the dead dry cargo truck drivers resulting from accidents in the course of their work.”

Noting that the financial package provides for treatment for the injured and burial expenses for the dead, he explained that “it is still only a reprieve as money cannot compensate for loss of life or permanent disability resulting from an accident.”