Almost a year after an attempted forceful eviction from the waterfront, Makoko residents say they are planning to build a new city from the ruins of the old one. But at present, no living compares to the one they have. Seun Akioye reports
Early every morning, Jesu Semadegbe jetty in Makoko slums plays host to hundreds of commuters jostling to catch one or the other of several hand paddled canoes which are trying to find their way into the tiny stretch of the jetty.
Because there are as many as 50 canoes trying either to berth or depart the shores for the Makoko floating houses built on Lagos Lagoon, from the tiny stretch of the jetty which can only accommodate 10 canoes at a time, there is usually what the locals call “canoe jam.”
Most of the drivers are children slightly above 10 years old and they jostle to get the attention of passengers each offering what is termed a “competitive price” for a trip on the dirty black water of the Lagoon. In the ensuing chaos, school children get pushed over each other, market women and floating supermarkets get locked up in the labyrinth, people scream, some children cried, confusion reigned, it was total disorder.
This is Makoko, a slum community that afflicts the heart of Lagos. Not many Lagosians have been to this slum or even heard about it. It is a community, totally excluded from civilisation , hidden from the prying eyes of Lagos residents. Standing in the middle of Yaba, it is difficult to believe Makoko exists, but it does and it is only a few kilometres away.
The community is divided into two, the land and the sea. On the land, the houses are built tightly against each other leaving only tiny, long and winding pathways to serve as roads. Inside this part of Makoko, almost every house has a store either in front or by the side. By the northern fringe, a small house could be distinguished as belonging to a herbalist. A man sat inside the dimly lit sitting room while the herbalist prepares concussion in the inner room. On the entrance of the house, he drew a rectangle using different colours.
By the side of the house, two boys began to prepare two local chickens killed in the most violent fashion, smiling as they perform what obviously was a pleasurable task. All around the neighbourhood, the only thing that remains constant is the filth.
But the sea offers a totally different view of the slum. From Jesu Semadegbe jetty, there are at least 200 houses built on stilts. From a point on the Third Mainland Bridge, one can see several huts dotting the waterfront landscape ‘floating’ on the water.
Makoko is a community that has defied and astonished scientists and environmentalists who had predicted one doom after doom for the area and its people. Despite the unsanitary conditions, the harsh living environment and unavoidable nature’s interference, the community has remained. But its invincibility came to an end in July 2012, when fed up with the horrible spectacle the community presents to the city, the Lagos State Government decided to put an end to its existence. In the ensuing destruction, several houses built on the water were demolished in one fell swoop. It was in that operation that Hounkpo Yawani Timothy, a community leader was killed, allegedly by the bullets of a police officer attached to the demolition team. A team of human and environmental rights activists have since risen up in fierce defense of the community. Today, there is a Tee shirt which many of the youth in Makoko wears with the inscription: “Makoko, our home. We have a right to remain.”
Life on the water is good
The inhabitants of Makoko are majorly the Egun people of Badagry though there are sprinkle of Ijaw and Ilaje people too. Egun is the official language of the community both on land and water. According to available statistics, there are more than 10,000 inhabitants of Makoko, many of whom work outside the community. But a majority of the people follows after the profession of fishing; this is especially true of the women.
The journey into the heart of Makoko begins from JesuDegbe jetty, where several canoes and their child drivers are waiting. The kids are used to tourists who just want to paddle round the area and see the community and the kids are quick to spot such tourists.
“I can take you around and you just pay me N1,000 ,” one said. Other disputed with him and one even went as low as N200 for a round trip of the community. The canoes are not especially safe and for many of them, the driver had to bail out water which had accumulated inside during the previous trip before starting a new one.
Makoko water is dirty and black and this is where half of the houses were built. As one paddles along the tiny waterways which often turn into a labyrinth, the poverty of the inhabitants of the slum stared hard in the face. Children played outside the houses, while their mothers cook lunch in kitchens, standing beside the living room. Most of the houses on the water are single room apartments all built closely together leaving little space for canoes to pass in between.
As one canoe passes the other, they make desperate efforts not to collide but were not often successful as accidents are frequent but no one had fallen into the river yet. Sometimes, three canoes can collide with each other and the guilty driver is scolded as each tried to entangle himself from the other.
One of the greatest challenges of Makoko is sanitation. None of the houses had a toilet or sewage disposal. All dirt, including human wastes are safely deposited in the water which also serves as the bathroom and toilets. It is not uncommon to find a child doing his toilet on one part of the river while another child is taking a shower on the further side. This is where all the washings are done too and when one needs clean water for cooking, you simply jump into your canoe and paddle further down towards the bridge to fetch the water.
The greatest need of an average Makoko resident is a canoe. All children are taught how to paddle from early stage and with that they learnt to swim. But it may be economically tasking for the poor people of Makoko as a small canoe costs a staggering N22,000. Many families rely on the commercial canoe for transportation. A typical children’s play may involve hide and seek under the houses, the child that can stay longer under the dirty black water wins.
But, it is hard to see a Makoko resident speak ill of the community. For many of them interviewed by The Nation, life is good in Makoko.
“Living here is not hard because the work and the culture of the people blend with the environment,” Reverend Peter Dosu, of the Makoko Methodist Church told The Nation. For four years, he has been in charge of the church in the community and seen it grow to about 250 memberships.
“The houses are better than the houses you find in Victoria Island, in the view of the people. Here, there is natural breeze, you can never hear that the houses collapsed. Also here, there is no sickness or any of that criminality you often find in town and the people have no problem,” Dosu said.
Monday Zola agreed with Dosu. A native of Makoko, Monday, has lived all his life on the water and though he learnt the art of fishing from his parents he is also a trained fashion designer.
“This is our home, the only one we know. We were born here and we are fishermen. I do not see any reason why we should leave this place, we are peace loving people and we don’t have any problems,” Zola said.
But, for Banke Olorunwa, who recently finished his secondary education at the Lagos City Senior College Yaba, only God can make him leave Makoko. “Do you know why we will remain here? It is because when you go outside, there is no work, but here our people are fishermen and as long as there are fishes there will be jobs for us. We live freely here no robbers, no disease or any problem, only God knows if I will leave this place.”
Floating supermarket,
dispensary
Katherine Lokosu steers her boat away from the jetty, retrieved her paddle from the floor of the canoe and began to paddle slowly. Inside her tiny canoe, the fire from the stove which stood in the middle burned with steady intensity. A small pan filled with hot oil sat on the stove while another pot filled with cooked beans sat beside it.
Lokosu is not your typical entrepreneur. She is one of the several hawkers who ply their wares all over Makoko from the comfort of their canoes, call them the floating supermarket and you will be right. From food to stationeries and drugs are sold by these hawkers rowing all over the water and calling out their wares. But the strange part is that, they cook the food in the canoe and somehow manage to paddle at the same time.
“I sell beans and puff puff and I cook them from this canoe,” Lokosu said. She, like the others, has an intricate accounting system whereby she buys her raw food on credit and pays back after hawking round the lagoon.
“I chose to sell this way. If we don’t, the people living on the water won’t have anything to eat. So we are doing a good service,” she said.”
The floating canteen is always a pleasurable sight to behold. The seller yells out her wares in a sing song “Lessin nan walo” (rice seller is here) and buyers emerge from their stilt houses, move close to the canoe and complete the transaction.
A lesson from
Sustainability Academy
On Friday, May 23, 2014, the train of Sustainability Academy of the Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), landed on the waters of Makoko. Led by the Executive Director and frontline environmentalist, Nnimmo Bassey, the academy chose Makoko as the venue for its third in the series of sustainability workshops tagged: Turmoil in Africa: Uprising or Chaos? It had held in Abuja and Bori, Ogoni.
The youths of Makoko treated the visitors like royalties. A boat was hired and the cultural troupe made up of young boys and girls and armed with drums, sticks and their voices set sail for the Whanyina Nursery and Primary School known to the outside world as the floating school, venue of the workshop. Many children and adults left their posts to witness the unusual spectacle as the community converged on the floating school.
Bassey said, only Makoko is a metaphor for resilience in the face of enormous pressure, the lessons of Makoko, he said can only be denied by the outside world to its peril. He described the community as a place for opportunities and hope.
Drawing intricate lessons from the community, Bassey said the houses in Makoko were built in sync with nature and not against it. “Makoko teases the sea by sitting on it. The floating school speaks volume about how to face sea level rise and deflect its sting, it is built and designed to float so that if sea level rises it rises with it,” Bassey said.
The instigator of the Academy, Firoze Manji, an environmentalist and Director of Pan African Institute of ThoughtWorks praised the people of Makoko for their resilience and courage in building a better life for themselves.
He said the academy was in the community as a sign of solidarity but berates the government for allowing the people to suffer. “Nigeria, the country with the highest GDP in Africa allows her people to suffer, when you go along the water, you will see the high level of pollution. The people here need adequate health service,” Manji said.
HOMEF places the responsibility of sustaining the environment on the government. “Nigerian and African leaders must protect our environment and peoples from the activities of rampaging resource extractors, ensure that environmental costs do not continue to be externalised to the people/environment and that ecological crimes are severely sanctioned.”
A Makoko of the future
The grouse of the Lagos State government against Makoko dwellers are many but chief among them are safety and health concerns. But the people of the community have come up with an ingenious plan to forestall any further plans of the government to demolish the houses.
“The community has a new plan for the houses on the water that will have all modern amenities, there is a new innovation in the new plan and I hope the government can accept that plan,” Dosu said.
The new developmental plan, The Nation gathered will include toilet facilities for all the houses and new and improved designs that would make for healthy living for the people. It was also gathered that there will be no structures under the power line.
“We are still here because of the intervention of human rights activists, the tension is down and we have a new development plan for this place so the government doesn’t need to demolish this place, we will develop this place and better things will come to us,” Mattew Kusikan, a youth executive said.
It is easy to picture a new floating city, complete with all the modern amenities and infrastructures. Schools, water road tracts, all carefully laid out. And as millions of Lagosians ply the third mainland bridge every morning, neon lights and gigantic signboard welcome the onlookers to Makoko. This is the dream of Daniel, a 14-year-old boat taxi driver.
But for now, he has to descend from his high horse of day dreaming and face the ‘future’ at hand. He has made barely N200 that day and was desperate for more. “I will take you round Makoko, you will go to the floating school, there is a party there now. Just pay me N500,” he told a newly arrived tourist.
The visitor agreed and Daniel jumped into his canoe and paddled furiously down the dirty black waters of his home. In his mind, he was paddling towards the neon lights.
