| Lagos peculiar mega
city challenge
By Ugwumsinachi Anozie
Sunday, February 22, 2009
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•Fashola
Photo: Sun News Publishing |
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Defining Lagos as "the Centre of Excellence" presupposes
that the populace is doing well in all facets of life - in
business, tourism, commerce, banking, craftwork and others.
There is this general atmosphere of boom.
However, a deeper examination of the phrase throws up the
fact that it goes beyond being excellent in the aforementioned
areas. It assumes the existence of a value system people are
willing to embrace and subscribe to. It presupposes that the
ladies should display lady-like mannerism and carriage while
the men are really gentlemen in deed, action and thought.
Excellence presupposes civility in manner.
But in the light of realities on ground, one can only define
Lagos as the centre of aberration. When I first set foot on
Lagos, I noticed certain things that were uncommon in other
parts of the country. My first sour experience was when I
wanted to board a bus from Cele bus stop along Apapa-Oshodi
Expressway to Mile 2. I initially thought that buses stopped
and parked properly before passengers disembarked. I equally
thought that Lagos residents loved to board buses in similar
civilized manner.
On the contrary, I was shocked to discover that a bus ride
in Lagos was very hazardous, that it was simply a survival
of the fittest. People pushed and tore at each other to get
into a bus. Bursting with passengers, the buses hardly stopped
to drop off passengers before they bolted away again. Passengers
broke into a run, pursuing buses as if they were the last
hope of their lives.
I later learnt that the haste was due to constant harassment
by 'area boys', who have turned the bus stops to toll collection
points. The 'alaye disease' has festered for too long, and
the state government knows about it but does nothing to stop
it. Children are also not spared as even those of school age
now manifest such base animal instinct.
Currently, massive infrastructure development is ongoing across
the state in line with the government's drive to give Lagos
a mega-city status. But are we going to have a mega-city with
a distorted value system? For instance, a commercial bus driver
obstructs traffic movement simply because he wants to slug
it out with another driver who mistakenly bumped into his
car. For him, if the other road users can't wait for him to
sort out things with the offender, they can go to hell.
Dashing across the highway when pedestrian bridges have been
provided is another sad feature in the state. This is, however,
an indictment on the law enforcement agencies. Our people,
adept at value perversion, will encourage one not to use the
pedestrian crossing. They say it is time wasting, and Lagosians,
in their peculiar haste, easily accept this argument. Preventable
accidents have often occurred as a result of this. Government
officials drafted to check the trend have seen in it an avenue
for self-enrichment. What they do is stand like passengers
on both sides of the bridges, waiting for unsuspecting offenders
to walk straight into their embrace. At the end of the day,
offenders are fleeced and allowed to go scot-free.
On another front, the state government deserves some kudos
for its current war against street trading. But the skepticism
among most residents is that let us wait for another six months
and see whether the traders will not return to the streets
like before.
The state government should do all within its power to instill
values that would bud and develop alongside a developing mega
city. Lagosians on their part need to live out values that
are in tandem with the designation "Centre of Excellence.”
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