The Lagos State Government has unveiled plans to make the waterways safe, attractive and lucrative, writes ADEYINKA ADERIBIGBE
Later bodies have, for centuries, provided man with various opportunities, chief of which remains transportation. From dugout canoes to boats, ships, yachts and cruise liners, the waters have offered opportunities for transportation, fishing, tourism, or other economic benefits.
With about 60 per cent of its landmass covered by water, Lagos has a comparative advantage in water transportation, a fact its successive governments seem to have neglected.
Professor Kayode Oyesiku, last year, was on point when he said criminals and kidnappers had found a safe route for carting away their loot and victims kidnapped on Lagos waterways. This, according to him, is possible because the state has failed to take ownership of its waterways.
Dean, School of Transportation, Lagos State University (LASU), Professor Samuel Odewunmi, in a paper, argued that water transportation is not making any desired impact on the state’s public transportation system and the lives of the people as less than one percent of the state’s mobility is by water.
The failure to maximise the commercialisation of its waterways further explains why passenger traffic, which hit two million between 2012 and 2013, had bottomed out, jeopardising official projections to grow waterways’ passenger traffic marginally to five million monthly.
Lagos has over 56 jetties, all of them mostly in various stages of neglect and decay. Many are without concrete platforms and where they have, the jetties have become dysfunctional.
Many of the jetties are in Ikorodu, more than in any other part of the state, because of its large water area and proximity to Ibeju-Lekki and Lagos Island.
The Ikorodu jetties are in Ijede, Igbogbo, Baiyeku, Ipakodo, Ebute and Majidun.
Odewunmi observed that many of the jetties were not functional while those working were fragmented as they experienced infrequent ferry services and low passenger traffic. Many of the jetties are decrepit and only useful for small local fishing and passenger services.
“The roof of many of the walk ways are blown off in may places and their building walls require urgent attention to avoid a catastrophe,” Odewunmi said.
He listed the jetties at Ijora, Ijede, Ibeshe, Baiyeku, Takwa Bay, CMS, Coconut, Alex, and Oworonsoki, as the few with damaged concrete platforms and walkways, while the best of them are in Ikorodu, Sagbokoji, Ijegun-Egbam, Badore, Ebute Ojo and Ikorodu Metro.
He canvassed that toilets and recreational facilities be embedded in future plans for new jetties.
The journey
The Commissioner for Waterfront Infrastruture Development Mr Adebowale Akinsanya recently said the government is coing up with mega terminals in some strategic axis of the state as part of efforts to stimulate water transportation. One of such, he announced is the Oworonsoki Terminal.
Although Lagos ferry services began operations in 1925, large bodied passenger ferries were a rarity until the 1970s.
In its determination to integrate water transportation into its scope of inter-modal transportation system, Lagos State, in 1983, established the Lagos State Ferry Services Corporation, otherwise known as Lagferry, not only to provide ferry services on the state’s waterways and work in conjunction with Lagos State Waterways Authority (LASWA), National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA) and the Nigeria Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), but to also regulate operations on the state’s waterways.
With Lagferry regulating, other private ferries began to provide commercial transport services among Ikorodu, Lagos Island, Apapa and Victoria Island. Baba Kekere and Ita Faji mass transit ferries, which were highly subscribed to began shuttles from Mile 2 to Marina.
The gains of the state’s interventions of the 80s were, however, soon lost to policy summersault as the Mile 2 Jetty, which served as Lagferry headquarters, was soon abandoned, and later taken over by Lagos State Transport Management Authority (LASTMA), which converted the terminal to a park for seized vehicles.
Although the seized vehicles were evacuated and the terminal renovated in 2012, the project, however, was abandoned.
But with its commitment to intermodal transportation, there are indications that the state might just be ready to push the tourism potentials of water transportation and inject fresh air into an otherwise moribund sector.
Flagging off some of its projects earlier in the year, Governor Akinwunmi Ambode said: “Our goal is to activate the Badore Jetty as we commence the reforms in our water transportation.”
While government continues to tinker with this reform, Lagferry’s Executive Director, Mr. Paul Kalejaiye, said the government, in the short term, is willing to hand over the Mile 2 jetty to a private developer.
“A developer would in the next two weeks begin the redevelopment of the Mile 2 Jetty,” Kalejaiye said, adding: “What that means is that in the next one week, you’ll see the commencement of work.”
He continued:”The governor has approved that the jetty be turned into a world class jetty. The jetty, which is going to be built on a Build Operate and Transfer (BOT), is going to have a shopping mall, cinema, and all other activities that befit a very good jetty. It would be a modern terminal that would have a parking barge for riders.”
Work, he said, would have started on the site, but for the need to wait to obtain all the necessary approvals. “Now that that is done, we are set to commence a monumental structure that would return Mile 2 to better days far beyond the days of Baba Kekere, but better days of Lagos ferries,” he said.
The governor, Kalejaiye said, has given approvals for the purchase of seven ferries to kick off its water transportation initiatives, which would be delivered by year end.
The ferries, he said, when operational, would set the permissible mode for transportation on its waterways.
The ferries, according to him, would boost government’s determination to strengthen intermodal transportation and reposition water travels in the state.
“Governor Ambode has approved the purchase of seven ferries by Lagferry for use on the waterways in his determination to replicate the similar transformation going on, on the bus scheme on the waterways,” Kalejaiye said.
The Lagferry chief said the governor has also instructed Lagferry to give some wave riders to the Lagos Response Unit (LRU) to ensure that LRU gets to scenes of boat mishaps faster and be in a better position to save lives of those in danger.
This is besides the channelisation and routes’ demarcation, which Kalejaiye said was ongoing to ensure that waterways operators perform unhindered.
“What we are determined to do is to ensure that dredgers and sand miners have restricted zones on which they would be operating thereby ensuring that they do not disturb the operations of ferry operators on the waterways,”he said.
He said the government was ready to provide security and protect lives and property on its waterways. “When the initiatives fully comes on stream, Lagosians would know that it is easier and safer to move on waters, using watercraft like ferry, to travel from the some parts of the mainland to parts of Lagos Island,”he said.
He added that though the government would be setting the tone for the kinds of crafts to be used on its waterways, it would be open to more investors.
Metro Ferry Services Limited, Sea Coach Ferry Services Limited, and Texas Connection Ferry Services, are a few of the players with investment in modern ferry boats, carrying passengers from Ikorodu to Lagos Island, Badore, Apapa and Marina.
