Abimbola Akosile
14 August 2007
opinion
Lagos — Last Friday, reports stated that the new Minister of State for Transportation, Prince John Emeka, and his entourage allegedly drove against the traffic on Burma Road, Apapa, Lagos, thereby causing chaos and a traffic grid-lock.
The minister, according to a popular evening publication, was on his way to the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) as part of his tour of agencies under his ministry. He was said to be in the company of the Director-General of NIMASA, Dr. Ade Dosunmu, when the action took place.
According to the publication, Emeka's decision to drive against the traffic led to his being trapped for more than one hour in the resultant gridlock, while the minister and those with him, watched helplessly as motorists and commercial vehicle drivers blared their horns ceaselessly and maneuvered through illegal routes to escape from the traffic jam. Before the ugly incident, traffic was light and vehicles were moving freely on the normal route, the publication (P.M. News) observed.
From the fore-going, it is clear that a traffic jam is no respecter of any person, whether Minister or D-G or charlatan. Even though the Government has restricted the use of sirens to only some top personalities and government functionaries, these top officials still relish harassing the average man whenever the occasion arises.
A question would have been, what did the Lagos State Traffic Management Agency (LASTMA) do when they discovered that it was a Minister that allegedly caused the delay. No one needs guess what would have happened if the defaulter was an average Lagosian who was in a hurry to get home from work.
The menace of petroleum tankers in Lagos cannot be overlooked in this issue of driving against the traffic. When recalcitrant tanker and trailer drivers take it upon themselves to choke available roads on the Apapa-Oshodi route, then impatient motorists especially commercial bus drivers are bound to drive against the traffic.
The whole scenario is a vicious cycle and the problem would persist unless the defaulters, even powers-that-be are brought to book speedily by concerned regulatory officials.
The issue of a widening patch of bad road along Ikeja expressway is also causing grave concern for motorists in Lagos and beyond. The arterial route, which falls under Federal Government jurisdiction appears to have been abandoned by repairers or road rehibilitators.
Daily are numerous motorists subjected to endless minutes of delay caused by a patch that is less than three metres square. The loss of man hours cannot be calculated by intra and inter-state travellers and the earlier something is done by the new Minister for Transport, the better. The time for apologies for bad roads is over, the time for action is now. Enough said.
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