For most residents of the federal capital territory metropolis and its environs, the dream of where heavy traffic buildup will not turn the peoples' lives into one unending nightmare and a living hell may be over as heavy traffic hold up has taken over all the roads leading into and out of the FCT, causing road users grave pain and misery.

Heavy traffic build up on the Lagos roads which became the order of the day in the former federal capital of the country was a major contributing factor to making Lagos uninhabitable for many Nigerians who felt that the then capital had become over-congested and there was urgent need to either expand the capital or relocate it.

Then the tale of woe of most Lagos residents was that a journey which ordinarily would not take more than 45 minutes would take the Lagos residents nearly four hours as they would be trapped on the road for hours due to the heavy traffic. To beat the traffic, most residents resorted to going to their places of work as early as 4am. "anytime after 6.30am the traffic hold up begins and one is forced to remain on the road for several hours while going to work. The same applied to after work hours. If a person must avoid the heavy traffic in the evening, he has to leave office from 10pm. This made life terribly unbearable for most people", Tunde, a ministry of works staff who said he was in Lagos before he was transferred to Abuja, told LEADERSHIP SUNDAY.

It was tons of relief for many Lagos residents when the then military government of Gen. Ibrahim Babangida ordered a swift relocation of the seat of power from Lagos to Abuja, the new Federal Capital Territory, FCT. Although the movement was given various interpretations at the time, most Lagos residents felt it was an answered prayer to relieve the state of the devastating chaotic traffic situation.

Apart from ministry officials whose relocation to the new capital was made compulsory, many Lagos residents who wanted desperately to escape the traffic situation also took advantage of the new capital to relocate to Abuja.

Abuja, a virgin capital became the land of opportunity for many Nigerians who were already fed up with the choking nature of Lagos state. From every nook and cranny of the country, the exodus to the new federal capital began. This was boosted by government's call and encouragement on Nigerians to come to help develop the capital.

It did not take long before the ugly traffic holdup which was the hallmark of Lagos crept into Abuja. This was made worse by the ill-concieved housing situation in the federal capital. Accommodation within the precinct of the metropolis of the capital became unaffordable for the majority of Nigerians who flocked into the city.

Due to the highly exorbitant accommodation fees, many who had moved to the FCT were forced to relocate to Lagos and other states. Those who compulsorily had to remain in Abuja, especially the ministry workers were forced to seek accommodation in suburbs very close to the metropolis where all the ministries and government departments have their offices.

It did not take very long before the FCT was defaced with shanties; ghetto springing up from all corners near the metropolis. This evoked the wrath of Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, former FCT minister, who embarked on a demolition spree when he was appointed minister by the former president Olusegun Obasanjo. The demolition exercise aimed at restoring the Abuja masterplan eventually forced many of the FCT residents to relocate very far away from the metropolis to avoid the FCT minister's bulldozers and catapillars. Most were forced to relocate to states such as Niger, Nasarawa and Kogi which share borders with Abuja. They had to come to work in the metropolis from those states.

The immediate outcome of this new arrangement was the heavy buildup of traffic on all the roads which lead into the FCT. Most residents who decried the ugly situation described it as evidence of government's neglect of the masses. According to them, if the government had the masses in mind when they were building the FCT, they would not have created the artificial scarcity of housing in the metropolis, forcing the price of accommodation in the metropolis far beyond the reach of the ordinary Nigerian.

The implication of living very far from the city centre is that long distances had to be covered on the road everyday to and from work. Apart from the poor housing arrangement for the country, legion of workers in the FCT, the government was also accused of not putting a workable transport system on the ground. These have contributed to making life for the average Abuja resident a living hell.

From any of the entry points to Abuja, including Nyanya- Mararaba, Kubwa, Suleja in Niger State and Airport Road in the morning, workers who ply the roads have nothing but tales of woe as they slug it out on the roads everyday . In the morning, it is a nightmare while in the evening, hell is let loose as road users desperate to get home, cause mayhem on the roads with the traffic jams.

According to aggrieved road users who lament that if they knew that Abuja would deteriorate within a short time, they would not have relocated in the first place. Initially, the roads were too narrow for the volume of cars it was beginning to accommodate on daily basis. They averred that because the roads wer just two lanes it was impossible not to have traffic build up daily basis. Coupled also with the poor state of the roads, they became a death trap of sort as fatal road accidents became the order of the day.

After FCT residents cried out, the government decided to embark on a project to expand all the major roads in the FCT. They became an ambitious expansion project with some of the road lanes being increased to between seven and ten lanes. To many of the residents, this became a welcome development since in their view, the road expansion would considerably reduce the heavy traffic situation in most of these roads.

However, shortly after the road expansion projects were commenced, the latest cry of the road users is the slow pace of the work being done by the construction companies handling the projects. According to some drivers and commuters who spoke with LEADERSHIP SUNDAY, the government gave the contract to firms which did not have the equipment to handle the Abuja roads which lie on a sprawling patch of rolling hills and twisting valleys.

The road users lamented the psychological trauma, stress and frustration which often suffer daily as they set out to work. According to them, there is no way the residents who suffer this excruciating traffic hold up everyday would give their best in their places of work.

A magistrate court judge who disclosed to LEADERSHIP SUNDAY that she had to travel from Suleja in Niger State to Wuse in the FCT where her court is, lamented that when they first came to Abuja, the situation was not this bad. According to her, the government neglected the capital's development for too long and only came back to it after the population of the FCT had risen beyond proportion.

'I doubt whether the government would be able to arrest the problem of traffic congestion in the FCT. If they had built the roads in anticipation of the volume of use it would be put into in the future, the residents of the FCT would not have been suffering this untold hardship on the roads. Imagine the pain I go through everyday coming all the way from Suleja. Before it was possible for me to make it to office before 8am that is if I leave my house at 7am but today, if I don't leave before 6am, I will not get to office by 9am. This is really unbearable. The government must intervene. We do not need these volumes of vehicles on our roads. That is why we must resort immediately to rail. With rail I believe these problems would disappear. But as it is today, Abuja resident are really suffering from this traffic situation.

A commercial driver who gave his name as Abiodun lamented his own ordeal on the road, saying the traffic situation has adversely affected the income he makes on daily basis. According to him, more than five hours of his working hours is wasted waiting for traffic to move.

"I don't know what I am going to do. I am not government but I pray that this government will do something about this traffic situation". It is not giving the FCT a good name. In fact people are beginning to say that Lagos traffic is becoming better than Abuja traffic especially, with what Fashola is doing. I doubt if the government will be able to address this problem. There are many people coming into Abuja from the other states and suburbs around the FCT more people will come. The government must do something urgently before the city will collapse", he said.

A commuter who said he was into contracts lamented that since the road situation in the FCT deteriorated, he has found it difficult to meet up with appointments as he would always get there late due to undue long hours on the roads. He called on government to intervene before the residents would breakdown under the burden of the ugly traffic situation

Some commuters who spoke with LEADERSHIP SUNDAY on the Kubwa road traffic hold up said they spend hours on the road that, ordinarily, should have been less than 30 minutes drive. They moaned that the hold up starts as early as 6. 00 am and stretches till about 11.00 am from Kubwa up to Gwarimpa on daily basis. Some of the residents disclosed that people get stucked in the hold up sometimes for several hours before proceeding to their various destinations in the city. Their worry they said is that they never get to find out what was the actual cause of the problem.

A road safety officer who gave his name as Cletus said the problem of road traffic build up is usually caused by impatient drivers who want to get to their homes before others. According to him, as long as drivers continue to over speed and disobey traffic rules in their impatience, no matter the number of lanes created, the hold up would still continue.

As it stands, the problem of traffic hold up in the FCT has come to stay. According to an official of the road safety who spoke with LEADERSHIP SUNDAY from the FRSC headquarters, road traffic hold up is a phenomenon all over the world where there is a large population. He however noted that the people's determination to maintain traffic rules and drive with reasonable speed limit, the problem would be minimized.