By Adeyemi Adeleye
A former Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in South Africa, Mr Bola Babarinde, has urged Gov. Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State to restore sanity on roads and public places in the state.
Babarinde, also the Deputy Director Sanwo-Olu/Hamzat Campaign Council, Diaspora Directorate, in a statement on Wednesday in Lagos decried the blatant disregard for law and order by motorists in the state.
“Enough of lawlessness and issues of area boys, and the street urchins controlling the affairs on our roads.
“There are solutions to these menace and we, APC in diaspora, are ready to partner with the administration of Babajide Sanwo Olu for a greater Lagos.
“Lagos roads, drainages, markets and other public places are worth to be declared state of emergency both in maintenance and management,” the diaspora leader said.
According to him, Lagos should be sanitised like the situation in the 70s and 80s when orderliness pervaded all public places.
“We all grew up in Lagos and life was so great in the seventies and early eighties during our primary, secondary and university days when orderliness in the society was the normalcy.
“We had scholar tickets for buses which was our school uniforms and badges, meal ticket in cafeterias and luncheon voucher gifts from our elder ones working in reputable companies like Total, Mobil and Texaco, these vouchers are accepted at Dominos and Ilupeju supermarkets to mention but a few.
“Life was really full of excitement and hope in those golden days.
“Almost everyone was law abiding; queuing at bus stops before boarding buses was normal, driving against flow of traffic never even imagined and yes, conductors calling destinations at bus stops rent the airs but with level of decency and decorum,” he recounted.
He said that at the time, the Lagos Metropolitan Transport Services buses had signs of their destinations with regular checkers in those buses to fish out fraudulent passengers “and sanity prevailed in Lagos.”
The APC chieftain said that the massive influx of people from other regions due to the rural-urban migration “of the late eighties till now brought more of negatives than blessings.”
“There are lots of recklessness, lack of respect for others, outright disregards to law of the land and disrespect to indigenes are now orders of the day with visitors calling our once beautiful Lagos no man’s land.
“Really, is Lagos no man’s land? Yes, partly as laws are broken without corrective punitive measures, the yellow buses drivers never obeyed traffics lights and officers.
“They are laws on to themselves. Okada and Keke riders are the Kings and Queens of the roads always ready to insult and assault anyone who dare to correct them to ply the roads rightly,” Babarinde said.
According to him, nowadays, manual truck pushers for waste and water carriers now ply major roads with an arrogant sense of road ownership that is daily posing dangers to other road users on Lagos roads.
He noted that the State Ministries of Transportation and Environment had considerable progress in enforcement, “but a state of emergency would have to be declared in both ministries for sanity to prevail on Lagos roads and public places.”
According to him, recently the Lagos State Public Works Corporation is embarking on palliative rehabilitation of damaged roads.
Babarinde said that the repairs in most cases were “never enough to restore the acceptable riding qualities but just mere emergency potholes fillings with less emphasis on road surface quality.”
The diaspora leader said that many Lagos roads actually needed complete reconstruction.
“Lagos needs innovative leadership which Mr Babajide Sanwo-Olu is bent on achieving in his second term with his listening ears and proactive leadership.
“The Lagos State Ministry of Transport and Ministry of Environment must work in tandem to bring sanity back to our lovely Lagos we grew up in.
“Our governor is a law abiding man and an ardent believer in the rule of law. So, we(APC in diaspora) are ready to work with him to leave an indelible mark in Lagos for his name to be written in gold,” he said. (NAN)
