19 November 2008
editorial
Lagos — Like many other privileges in this country, the use of sirens in times of emergency has been thoroughly abused. Such is the bastardization of this special facility that it now causes confusion, noise pollution and even accidents on our roads.
Originally, siren usage is intended to facilitate the movement of ambulances, fire trucks and security personnel in pursuit of fleeing criminals or rushing to a crime scene during peak hour traffic jams or in narrow inner-city streets. At a stage, top government officials such as presidents and governors appropriated its usage to ease their movements inside urban traffic snarls.
But this privilege, which is meant to facilitate movements of government officials on urgent official assignments, has been converted to a status symbol whereby one's worth in the society is deemed to be measured by the number of cars in your convoy and how loud one's outrider blares the siren. The situation worsened with the advent of military rule in the country, when the use siren became paraphernalia of office.
It is disgusting to see government officials, whose inaction cause most traffic snarls in the first place, harassing hapless citizens on the roads at the slightest traffic jam to make way for their convoy. Indiscriminate use of siren fosters segregation and hallmarks the arrogance of the ruling class over the rest of the citizens.
The menace of the sirens manifested in Lagos recently with the brutalization of a lady, Ms Uzoma Okere, by Naval ratings attached to a Rear Admiral. The lady's offence was said to be that she delayed in making for the Admiral's convoy in a traffic snarl.
It is against this backdrop that we welcome the move by the Lagos state government to regulate the use of sirens in the state. As a first step, the State Governor Babatunde Fashola has barred visiting governors and top government officials from using siren in the state. In announcing the ban, the governor said, and we agree with him, that "the use of siren by those in authority is a way of terrorizing taxpayers whom they are supposed to serve". The governor, who symbolically has not been using siren since he came to office, said those who do had " continued to constitute an unacceptable slur on the state's traffic management system".
This is a commendable step worthy of emulation by other state governors. For the ban to have the desired effect, it is expected that the governor's pronouncement would be followed up by a proper legislation by the state House of Assembly.
In the same vein, the National Assembly and various state houses of assembly should also address the misuse of siren to sanitize the nation's traffic system. The practice whereby every Tom, Dick and Harry would just blare the siren at the slightest traffic jam just to secure a quick right of way must stop. To be sure, every road user deserves courtesy from other road users. In other words, all road users are equal. As such, no motorist should be given priority over others. With the exception of emergency patient-bearing ambulances, fire fighting trucks and police rushing to crime scene, no other person or group of people deserve to use the siren.
It should be noted that the rule restricting the usage of siren to certain categories of people is not new to the country's statute books. The problem is that it has never been seriously enforced. So, if the brutalization of Uzoma by siren-drunk Naval ratings becomes the catalyst to resuscitate the law, we may have the lady to thank. And she may well become our own Rosa Parks. Parks' refusal to give up her seat in a public bus to a white man some 40 years ago began turning the wheels of the civil rights movements in the US.
Read comments. Write your own.
Copyright © 2008 This Day. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
Should be banned in all walks of life in the country. Except for the police , medical ,and fire
Thereis no doubt that the use of siren has been abused. In most countries, it is used for emergencies- ambulances transporting critically ill patients (not corpses), fire brigade rushing to put out fire, etc., etc. The use of siren by colonial governors was a show of force to remind the cowed population of their subjugation. Unfortunately, our "elected" officials (even those who had "landslide victories") continued the exercise. Subsequently, the armed forces, private individuals who regard themselves as "bigmen", banks and a host of others imbibed the habit. Over the years, our authorities have paid lip services to banning this obnoxious and irritating practice. Nobody has even come out with a practical solution as to what they expect the masses to do especially in tight situations. Does anybody have the political will to put an end to the bastardization of use of siren? That is the question!
To further buttress the relevance of this article I would add that the Hood does not make the Monk. Recognition is associated with a job well done not to openly show off like an empty drum that makes the most noise.
Secondly the Nigeria roads were not built to accommodate such fanfares but are only built as a passage way. The roads do not have Shoulders or rest areas where other road users could yield incase of emergencies hence I would imagine how the victim in this case had nowhere to go but was brutalized by her fellow countrymen in uniform for no fault of her own. Sirens are only used to dictate emergence in a life of death circumstance not even when a Head of State is passing.
Usually if the President is coming to a city say New York from Washington DC., the general public is given advance notice about the routes he would take. The roads are cordoned off with a de-tour signs so life goes on. A starving person in Nigeria does not give a damn about who the heck is in the convoy but is engrossed with how he/she is going to feed the family.
The use of Siren is outdated and reminiscent of the colonial era and should be outlawed by the modern government. It demeans fellow country men and women as though some people are more important than the others. It is a stratification tool to denote "We and them” with the former as the Napoleon and "them" as the rest of the animals in Animal Farm by George Orwell. You go figure.