ILLUMINATIONS
THE LAGOS QUESTION:

by SEGUN AYOBOLU

Was the Lagos State governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, being prescient when his very first act after being sworn into office was to issue two Executive Orders to decisively and speedily address the issues of indiscriminate refuse dumping, incessant traffic congestion and pot holes and crater-ridden roads across the state? The three problems are interconnected and mutually reinforcing. While giving marching orders to the Lagos State Waste Management Authority (LAWMA) to deal expeditiously with the refuse menace, the Lagos State Public Works Corporation (PWC) was also mandated and mobilized by the governor to immediately commence identification and repair of bad roads throughout the state.

On traffic management, the governor directed the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA) to begin to operate in two shifts, extended the working time of LASTMA operatives till 11pm while also increasing their duty allowances for higher motivation. As the rains ceaselessly flogged the state over the last few months with the attendant heavy flooding impeding traffic flow across the state, the valiant men and women of the agency could be seen in their yellow overalls and rain boots trying hard to carry out their arduous task in impossible conditions late into the night. The rains and bad roads were formidable obstacles to smooth traffic flow.

For most administrations, the temptation would be strong to put the blame on the challenges and problems they inherited from their predecessor. The Sanwo-Olu administration has not, happily, taken that beaten line. The commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Gbenga Omotosho, and other spokesmen of the government have been excellent. They have not engaged in needless buck passing but focused on what the government is doing to address and transcend the problems, which is what it was elected to do.

The past few weeks have indeed been a baptism of fire of sorts for Sanwo-Olu and his team. Lagosians are impatient with stories. All they want is action from their government, even if it requires performing miracles. You cannot blame them. To whom much is given, in this case the elected government, much is expected. Thank God, Sanwo-Olu and his team have not been sleeping after all. His commissioner for the Environment, Mr. Tunji Bello, and Special Adviser, Works and Infrastructure, Engineer Aramide Adeyoye, have been continuously on the road taking charge personally to ensure the effective delivery of the mandates of their respective ministries in these tough times.

Apparently frustrated by the sheer hell that moving in Lagos traffic had become, someone wondered on Facebook if the governor was missing. Sanwo-Olu’s response has been resounding, through action. The governor has declared a state of emergency on Lagos roads. Eight reputable construction firms have been mandated to immediately commence work on major roads repairs and construction across the state. Lagosians will surely soon enjoy a respite from the twin evils of crazy roads and crazier traffic but I don’t see much being done before the rains are over. The kitchen has surely been very hot for Sanwo-Olu these past few months but it was even hotter for the Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration during the first one year of his tenure 20 years ago.

Like I said earlier, Lagosians do not enjoy ‘stories’ from their governments. They would not listen to the argument that Tinubu came to office after years of neglect and ineptitude by the military; that the inherited problems would take time to overcome. Story. Lagosians were unimpressed. It was understandable. Most residents were still mesmerized by the much adulated performance of the preceding military administration of then Colonel Mohammed Buba Marwa, which had aggressively carried out sustained road patching and repairs across the state. This was in contrast to Marwa’s predecessor, whose administration had whined continuously that it could do nothing about the roads because of the non-availability of bitumen.

Even then, Tinubu stubbornly insisted that the patching of roads, inevitable as this was, would not be the defining essence of his legacy on roads. When the Tinubu administration awarded the construction of the then absolutely collapsed Kudirat Abiola road, Oregun, Ikeja, for a little less than N1 billion in Y2000, for instance, the PDP opposition was up in arms. They alleged that the contract sum was outrageous even though the road came complete with pedestrian walkways, drainage channels, street lights and the contract included payment for displacement and re-location of PHCN, Lagos Water corporation and telecommunications facilities among other costs.

But the important thing is that nearly 20 years after, the road stands as solid as ever with no single pot hole along its stretch. The same goes for scores of other durable and sturdy roads constructed by the Tinubu administration across Lagos State.

The Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN) and Akinwumi Ambode administrations also left admirable legacies of high quality roads, bridges and flyovers and their enduring projects dot the landscape of the state. If so, why does Lagos still grapple with the menace of so many bad roads and the attendant traffic complications, it is quite reasonable to ask? The answer is that the situation could most likely have been far worse but for the interventions by the successive administrations since 1999.

Lagos State is located below sea level. It is so easy to forget now, for instance, that the Atlantic Ocean routinely used to overflow the Bar Beach, on Victoria Island, resulting in loss of lives and eroding the commercial viability of the entire stretch of the Ahmadu Bello Way. But for the Tinubu administration’s deployment of technology to contain incessant flooding and considerable erosion of the bar beach, Victoria Island would have been faced with the serious danger of being submerged by the ocean particularly with the recent extreme twists in global weather conditions due to climate change. Before this, the Federal Government spent at least N2 billion annually simply pouring sand into the Atlantic Ocean to stem the erosion of the bar beach. It was neither an intelligent nor a sustainable response.

Even more, adversity in Lagos has been turned to advantage. Out of the reclaimed land of the Atlantic Ocean is springing up the breathtaking Eko Atlantic City, conceived by the Tinubu administration as possibly one of the most ambitious Public-Private-Partnership infrastructure projects in Africa and continuously nurtured by the Fashola and Ambode administrations with the support of the Federal Government. On completion, the new peninsula will accommodate 250,000 residents with an anticipated daily flow of 150,000 commuters while at the same time definitively halting the erosion of the state’s coastline.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the Sanwo-Olu administration will improve significantly on and even far surpass the performance of its predecessors. Both the governor and his Deputy, Dr Obafemi Hamzat, are men of high intellect as well as vast administrative and managerial experience. They know the state like the back of their hands and are focused and habitually committed to excellence. Yet, even after eight years in office, the Sanwo-Olu administration will most likely have left only a small dent in the problems of Lagos State despite its best efforts unless the Lagos question is decisively and urgently addressed.

As the governor and his deputy have stated on several occasions, the entire annual budget of Lagos State is far smaller than the budget of the New York City Fire Service for instance. Yet, this is the most populous state in Nigeria with residents from virtually every ethnic group in the country. This has serious financial implications for refuse generation and management, maintenance of security as well as provision of basic social services particularly in public healthcare and education to cite a few. Senator Oluremi Tinubu’s bill for the granting of special status recognition to Lagos was obviously shot down in the 8th Senate for political and untenable reasons. It is a matter that must be urgently revisited.

The larger percentage of revenues from Value Added Tax (VAT), Petroleum Tax Fund (PTF) and Education Tax Fund (ETF), among others, that go into the Federation Account is generated in Lagos. The Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) generate from Lagos yearly revenues that exceed the annual budget of Lagos for which the state gets nothing in return. Yet, the activities of thousands of heavy duty trucks going to and from the ports in Lagos wreak such terrible havoc on many of the state’s roads and bridges.

Indeed, one of the state’s most viable economic zones, the Apapa Central Business District, has been rendered prostrate and totally paralyzed over the years as a result of activities at the ports and the utter neglect by the federal government of its collapsed infrastructure in the axis until the advent of the Buhari administration.

A former Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Honourable Jokotola Pelumi, has launched an advocacy campaign for a more just and equitable treatment of Lagos in the Nigerian federation through adequate funding of the state commensurate with its substantial contributions to the national treasury. It is an effort that deserves support. Luckily, a former governor of the state, Tinubu, is National Leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and another former governor, Fashola, is Minister of Works and Housing. Surely, there cannot be a more propitious time to ensure that the Lagos question in the Nigerian federation is concretely addressed.

And it is time too for the Lagos State Chairman of the APC, Alhaji Tunde Balogun, to begin to address his mind to ensuring that the large number of registered voters in Lagos, the highest in the country, begins to count in elections through percentage turnout of voters that can no longer be taken for granted by those seeking to control power at the centre.