Politicians are difficult to understand. Hate them or love them, there is one beautiful thread running in their character that is puzzling. And that has to do with their ability for stealth and guile.
Over the years, they have successfully deceived us. The ordinary folk hate and kill themselves for politicians but get little or no recompense. Yet in the next election cycle, sugar-coated words drip from the lips of these same disappointing politicians like water from a pipe. The same suffering populace swallows the fake promises with passion, ready to sell their mothers in defence of their favourite politicians, who arm them to fight, kill or get killed, disrupt electoral processes and snatch ballot boxes and all manner of things to put their enemesis in office.
If any person had told okada riders and operators of keke in Lagos that they would be ordered off the streets by the state governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, they would probably have stoned that person for imaging the impossible or wishing them ill. Because, in Lagos, politicians have mastered the art of using street urchins and agberos for their electoral wars. But it has happened and has now reduced Lagos to a gym for all.
I heard it said that the city is no longer Lagos, but leg-us. This is simply because, right now, everybody treks in Lagos because of the okada ban. The imposed exercise is why people now also refer to Lagos as gym for all. On the streets and highways, one sees the rich, the poor, the young, the old, the strong, and infirm Lagos residents sweating it out, as they trek long distances, the aftermath of a thoughtless government policy.
Did the governor suddenly wake up from the wrong side of the bed and issue his ‘irreversible’ decree? Whether it is old law that he decided to enforce or not, it is a no brainer. He should have asked his predecessors why they did not enforce the law. Apart from their electoral value, the truth is that Lagos, unlike other cities, cannot afford to do without okada.
Before I’m misunderstood, let me state clearly that the ban is long overdue. However, government is in the bad spotlight because it mismanaged the policy. As a matter of fact, a metropolitan ‘mega’ city like Lagos does not need okada. But they have become part of our everyday life in the jumbled city despite their madness due to gaps in governance.
In Lagos, there are no roads. The many crater-filled spaces with that alias are forever snarled by traffic. That was how okada came on a rescue mission that has led in the opposite direction. Truly, the guys are quite reckless and lords unto themselves, especially the aboki among them. They drive against traffic with frenetic speed. They have swarmed the city like locusts and created panic that they may have a different agenda from mere okada operation.
The okada weave through the chaotic traffic with reckless abandon, causing quite a number of accidents that maimed and killed many a Lagosian. Yet the residents hug okada as if their lives depend on it. And, truly, their life depends on it because there is no way you can meet appointments in Lagos except with the help of the suicidal two-wheeler. The okada is daring and ferries its passengers to the desired destination as fast as Chief Gabriel Igbinedion’s defunct Okada Air, from which it derived its name.
The soaring unemployment rate also contributed to the surge of okada riders. Once any jobless fellow can turn the ignition of okada, feisty shylocks would give him one on hire-purchase at a cost almost double the cost of the bike. That is a major driver for the suicidal mission, as the okada rider, who may even be a university graduate, struggles to meet up with his target so that he does not default and lose the okada, no matter how much he had already paid. Unfortunately, by the time he finishes paying and the okada becomes his own, the machine would have been overworked and lost its value. The struggle continues.
Considering the okada menace, it is not that the people really love to ride okada. Rather, it is imposed on them by an evil system created by politicians, who do not just steal our votes but also our dreams. Do you not see how they celebrate and flaunt their N-Power policy in our face, as a laudable policy of government for job creation? And what is N-Power but a very degrading contraption that pays university graduates ‘a bag of rice’ (miserable N30,000) as monthly wage? Yet none of the relations of these politicians is enlisted in the N-Power scheme. Did we not see the gusto with which our own professor, a SAN, and Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, went kokoma dancing through stuffy markets distributing TraderMoni? Have we not heard that our recovered loot has been distributed the Nigeria’s poor? Or is it a case of relooting the loot? Ah, politicians! This country owes Abacha apologies.
So, government should own up to creating the monster called okada. The operators don’t love it as people think but had no choice than to cling to it. Their patrons don’t love it either as people think but have no choice if they must move around with ease. It is not as if Lagosians do not see the sense in the ban. The problem is putting the cart before the horse and expecting progress.
The state government said it was pushing more buses on the roads. Beautiful, but why did it not put the buses there first before the ban? What happens to commuters to places where its huge buses do not reach? Has it provided taxies for those areas too? Has it fixed the roads so that the chaotic traffic situation that gave birth to okada is effectively addressed? Did they consider the crime challenge that is the obvious concomitant result of suddenly dumping these youths back into unemployment? What happens to the jobless youth riding okada, has government provided alternatives for them? And how does government compensate those companies that invested billions in the okada business with seeming sane organisation?
It is obvious that these measures were not taken, especially the road condition and means of commuting the inner streets. That is why Lagos has turned into one large mass of trekking people, almost like a ‘legathon’ in process. The people are not really quarrelling with the policy but its timing and implementation.
Anyway, if okada is that dangerous, what is the rationale behind the selective ban instead of state-wide, since okada manifests the same wahala wherever it is found in Lagos except, perhaps, on the outskirts? It is also unfair to have picked on the poor okada whereas rickety killer trucks are left to block highways or drive with worn-out tyres unmolested because they are owned by the high and mighty.
It is not yet late to get it right, if they so desire. Proper things ought to be done. And that is hoping that, by 2023, stealthy politicians would not lift the ban again for fear of losing the election. Even if they do, one would expect the okada and its kindred to have got wiser and refuse to be used yet again.