The Federal Road Safety Corps has issued a warning to the general public about the sale of cars with number plates.
The agency advised that each number plate is the private property of the original owner of a car.
When selling the vehicle, the plate must be retained as any criminal incident perpetrated by the new owner will be traced to the person who registered it.
The communiqué reads: “Do not sell your vehicle with your number plate. Take it out because your number plate is your personal property.
“Let the new buyer go and get another number plate.
“If you should sell such vehicle with your number plate and it’s used to rob, kidnap, kill or run as one chance, the original owner of the number plate which the vehicle carried at the time of commiting the crime will face the music.
Spread this news to vehicle owners.
“Don’t suffer ignorantly.”
Elizabeth Akinlade, the Federal Road Safety Commission’s Sector Commander in Cross River FRSC, a few months ago, also alerted vehicle owners that the corps had a data bank of the original owners of all vehicles in the country, adding that when a car is sold a new buyer ought to do change of ownership.
“Don’t sell your vehicle with the plate number because in our data bank, the name of the original owner of the vehicle including his address is stored.
“If the vehicle is used to carryout a crime, with the information in our data bank, the original owner may be arrested even if he knows nothing about the crime but sold the car with the plate number.
“One of our strategic goals is to have a robust data-bank because without data you may not be able to do much,” she said.