It is necessary and indeed achievable, but with careful planning
For some Lagosians, it is difficult to contemplate what Lagos would look like when eventually danfo buses are off Lagos roads, in line with Governor Akinwunmi Ambode’s new vision of Lagos as a megacity. The governor had stated at a forum:”… I want to banish yellow buses from Lagos this year. My dream of ensuring that Lagos becomes a true megacity will not be actualised with the presence of these yellow buses on Lagos roads.”
We should understand why some people cannot contemplate this happening. Danfo is all they have come to know as the means of transportation in the metropolis. To most of us too who have been around for some time, we have been wondering how a place like Lagos came to be identified with what we used to regard as ‘backwater’ transportation means like okada. What we knew in Lagos before were Lagos Municipal Transport Service, Lagos City Transport Service and Lagos State Transport Corporation buses owned by the government, as well as some other buses owned by private individuals. One is talking of T.O. S. Benson, Zarpas, Osinowo Transport Service, etc. Of course we also knew the bole kaja and the molue which is fast becoming history.
Perhaps the most disgusting of all the developments that have happened to transportation in Lagos is okada. I remember vividly that up till the 1980s, long after okada had become an accepted means of transportation in some parts of the country, like Calabar and Kano, Lagosians would swear that that could never be the lot of Lagos.
But before our very eyes, that is in our lifetime, it has come to be in Lagos, our own Lagos, a clear manifestation of lack of foresight on the part of some of our leaders. Not only has it come to be; even attempts to phase it out have been met with brick wall, but for the determination of the state government to restrict its movement to certain routes. Otherwise, we would have been seeing okada more prominently than we are today in the state. Such is the popularity of okada in Lagos that we were told, early last week, that the state government was going to crush over 4,000 of them seized over their riders’ contravention of the state traffic law!
However, when one is talking about lack of foresight, one should put it in context because it was not all the leaders we have had in the state that lacked foresight. Unfortunately, those with lofty dreams sometimes did not have the capacity to see them through due to the fact that ignorance or dirty politics sometimes reigned supreme in high places here. For example, the Lateef Jakande administration in the state, as far back as the early 1980s, realised the need for mass transit as solution to the traffic logjam in the state and indeed began the process of actualising that through the Metroline project. Suddenly, the soldiers struck and the scheme became a victim of politics or ignorance, which ultimately led to its death at a loss of over $78 million to Lagos tax payers.
Without doubt, the decision to take danfo off Lagos roads is a welcome relief to many Lagosians. Many motorists in the state would tell you that any road that still has its sanity intact is so because the ubiquitous danfo drivers have not yet arrived. The moment they come, no one needs to herald their arrival. Israel Adesola, National President, Bus Conductors Association of Nigeria (BCAN), apparently in reaction to the state government’s decision to take danfo off the roads, said his members would, with effect from this month, start wearing badges, name tags and uniforms, following the state government’s approval.
They do not have any choice if they must fit into the new dream. The state government is spending a lot of money to change the face of transportation. Imagine the investment in places like the new bus terminal at Tafawa Balewa Square and other places. How the current crop of commercial bus operators (drivers and conductors) can fit into the new arrangement is yet to be seen. Most of them believe that their kind of job is for ruffians and they are not hiding it.
This is where Adesola got it wrong when he said that it is members of the public that regard the conductors as touts and illiterates. Both the drivers and the conductors are responsible for this perception. It is good that he expressed optimism that the government’s vision to transform the transportation sector in the state would impact positively on their members. Not many people share this optimism though, because it is going to be difficult for many of the drivers and conductors to adjust the same way it is difficult for a leopard to change its spots.
Unless old habits no longer die hard, I do not see how they can conduct their business without taking their usual ‘paraga’ or other things that make them high (and, sorry to say, sometimes irresponsible) while on duty. That many people have lost their lives due to the irresponsibility of many of these drivers and conductors is not in doubt. They hardly service their vehicles unless the vehicles completely break down. They drive without regard for traffic rules or other road users. It is difficult to imagine that a man in his right senses would remove his shirt and still be allowed to drive on the roads as some of these drivers and conductors do. Just as one would not expect any sane person to, at the slightest or no provocation at all, reach for his vehicle’s boot to fetch one dangerous object or the other with which to inflict injuries on the person with whom he is having altercation. This had sometimes led to avoidable deaths. In fact, it is doubtful if Lagosians would miss the danfo drivers and conductors much by the time they are off the road.
Without doubt, removing danfo from Lagos roads is a revolutionary and bold policy decision for which the Ambode administration should be commended. However, the government must not behave like Khedive Ismail, the king who ruled Egypt between 1863 and 1879, that has been described by some historians as “an impatient Europeaniser” on account of his haste to transform Egypt. The danfo buses have outlived their usefulness and, more importantly, that is not the way to go in a megacity that Lagos has become. How many danfo do we need to move the millions of people from one place to the other in the state daily? Mass transit is the way to go. But in order not to create any gap in the transportation process, the yellow buses must be taken out in phases.
It seems the government is aware of the need for this caution as well as the possible security implications of just throwing the danfo workers into the unemployment market and has therefore decided to accommodate them in the new scheme. This is why I was not surprised by a report denying that the state government wants to ban the danfo buses. As a matter of fact, I do not see its feasibility within this year as media reports earlier suggested because it would take a lot of planning, investments and even enlightenment to bring such dream to reality. So, the state government should save its breath. It is only natural that danfo would disappear gradually when the operators discover that they can no longer fit into the new dream. So, those in the business would do well to begin to think of the future without danfo buses. However, the government should bring the operators into the new picture so that we do not have security issues on our hands because this is going to happen if they are eventually thrown into the unemployment market. We should not be seen to be creating one problem in the attempt to solve another. It is possible some of them, drivers and conductors, would be able to adapt into the new scheme and even be a part of it. Such trainable persons should be absorbed and trained for the more productive enterprise rather than allowing them to continue with the jungle life that they think is their God-ordained lot. They are rendering an invaluable service, but it can and should be done better in a noble and respectable manner that the new dream promises.
