We must stop the carnage on our roads

Driving on Nigerian roads could be a nightmare even though once in a while it could also be pleasurable. But I’m sure most of us who drive will agree that anytime you get to your destination, there’s always a relief that one has escaped death.

The past week brought this reality into focus again in separate incidents across Lagos State. While I actually witnessed one, the others showed why our roads remain death traps for users and also a cauldron of repressed anger for many motorists that influence the way we drive and engage with others on the road. The incidents appear separate but a closer look will reveal that they were vignettes of a great malady afflicting our society which end result is usually death in most cases. Sometimes you wonder whether successive governments actually bother to look at statistics of casualties on our roads before designing any of their numerous intervention programmes of stopping the carnage.

On Wednesday, September 2, 48-year-old Abubakar Sulaiman was killed in a gruesome manner when a loaded 40 feet container fell on his car, a Toyota SUV, at the popular Ojuelegba Bridge in Surulere, Lagos. Thanks to the Saturday Punch newspaper, which put faces and names to the casualties, some of us probably might not have felt much pain or we could just shrug our shoulders and continue as though nothing untoward happened. There were two other occupants in the car, Umaru Sulaiman, 45, and Kamilu Umar, 38, and they were coming from Apapa going back to Murtala Muhammed International Aiprort where they worked as bureau de change operators. Abubakar left behind five children with his 16^th wedding anniversary scheduled to hold on October 24 and according to his brother, his youngest sibling, Mukthar, died in a road accident too last year in Katsina State, two weeks before his wedding. Kamilu had four children while Umaru had eight children, two days after his death; Kamilu’s new baby was christened. I’ve gone to this extent for us to remember that casualties on our roads are people like us with family members and responsibilities. Fortunately, another person whose car was crushed in the accident, Lasisi Akeem, escaped unhurt.

The accident raises vital questions: who regulates the movement of articulated vehicles on our roads? Among the plethora of agencies on our roads, LASTMA, FRSC, Nigeria Police, VIO, and FERMA, which is actually responsible for monitoring the movement of such vehicles. A television report claimed that the penalty for failure to latch containers is a paltry N5, 000, which is an incentive not to latch them at all. How come governments allowed railway to deteriorate that haulage must be solely on roads? How many people have been prosecuted successfully for major traffic infractions like the Ojuelegba one? For instance, a car gets bad on the road, FRSC men swoops on you and slam a fine while an articulated vehicle develops fault, they will beg their drivers to move the trucks away from the road. Truly, they are the kings of our roads.

Another incident was the one involving former Governor Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom State, now senator and minority leader. His Mercedes Benz SUV, in an attempt to beat a red light in Abuja, rammed into a United State embassy car leading to his hospitalization at the National Hospital, Abuja. After discharge, he jetted out for further treatment in London where he cheekily issued a statement saying he was glad to be alive. Even if we ignore the fact that despite his claim of building a ‘world-class’ hospital in Uyo, his state capital, only a London hospital befits someone like him which shows that more money does not automatically translate into more sense, how many times have we witnessed government officials’ vehicles driving against traffic or beating traffic lights with absolute disregard for other road users. This leads me to a FRSC Ford vehicle with registration number, A01 140RS, which beat a red light on Lateef Jakande Way, Agidingbi, Ikeja, Lagos on September 3 at the junction of Ashabi Cole Street some minutes after 8am. It was not only shocking but also painful that those charged with maintaining law and order on our roads are actually the ones perpetrating illegality. After I tweeted about this, a television station, TVC, posted three short videos that show the FRSC officials in physical combat earlier with a commercial bus driver and some of its passengers before fleeing the scene. See one of the videos here https://youtu.be/4poxz8ZEKcc 

The Lagos State government on Sunday, September 6, at a press conference announced a restriction on movement of articulated vehicles between 6am and 9pm with a promise to deal with erring drivers. But I ask the government to proceed cautiously as this might lead to another logjam with the vehicles parking indiscriminately just to obey the order. Let’s have a holistic approach to this menace before they kill more citizens.