Robbery on Eko Bridge? Take this one-way

BY OPEOLUWA AGUNBIADE

This incident is about two months late, but the solution provided therein and having an unplanned visit to the police station, having a chatty conversation with them for over an hour has called for writing this.

On the evening of 18th July 2019, at about 8:30pm, I was driving home. My eyes caught a glimpse of two men having what looked like a casual — but rather long — conversation with the driver of the car, just one car ahead of mine in bumper-to-fender traffic on Eko bridge.

The first thought that came to me was perhaps, the driver was asking for directions, but another thought wondered why would anyone be asking for direction from two random passersby not hawking gala, chips or popcorn on a one-directional road, so I continued looking, curious to get an answer to the little debate now going on in my head.

Just seconds later, I was brought back to reality when one of the men raised his shirt and CASUALLY put a gun in his trousers, crossed over to the other side, and walked away calmly, I quickly switched lanes, only then did I fully understand what had happened. I saw passengers in a Danfo (bus) all looking in the direction of the victim’s car in amazement, we had all just seen a robbery, and it was no movie.

Just about two to three minutes later, I saw pot-bellied, physically unfit policemen running on foot frantically towards my direction, guessed other motorists had informed them of what was happening (had happened). Did they catch the thieves? I do not know, but I hoped so.

There are usually policemen at the diversion point to Costain and at National Stadium Surulere, this particularly gives me enormous confidence driving late in traffic and I’m for this GRATEFUL to the men of the Nigeria police for the sacrifice of standing on the roads at such odd times and making the rest of us safe.

But, even with armed policemen at faraway Costain diversion point, robberies still happen on that two-kilometer bridge and landward extension and we clearly cannot have armed policemen at every 100-meter point, that wouldn’t be an efficient thing to do, but we can reduce these ugly incidents.

Recall that in 2009, the government was involved in a $470 million CCTV provision and installation in Abuja and Lagos scam. The few installed are not working, the rest, no one can see them, but money has gone down the drain, and nothing, as usual, has come out from the house of representatives probe into this sham since 2016. But that’s not the subject today.

I’m rather humbly suggesting that private organizations, businesses, consider fixing this low hanging problem with their next CSR budget. It doesn’t have to be the whole of Lagos, Eko bridge is known for petty robberies, phones and other valuables snatching, sometimes at gunpoint even breaking car windows in traffic, we can’t just talk about this in fear and not act. The governments we have today do not have the mental capacity to even digest these problems nor the will to solve it because it doesn’t affect them in any way, not even at the polls.

A private company can fund the installation of solar-powered CCTV cameras and street lights on just Eko bridge, while another organization takes it from National Stadium to Maryland and so on, telling the whole world via product and services adverts on these poles that they fixed this problem for Nigeria.

The command and control center for these installed cameras can be where policemen usually station on these roads, monitoring activities of would-be criminals including those with the intent of destroying these cameras or stealing the solar batteries, etc., invariably proactively discouraging these activities while keeping our roads safe. These CCTV cameras would also be of great help to the police in solving criminal activities that may still occur on these roads.

If we keep waiting for Nigerian politicians to do this, the wait labour would be in vain.

Opeoluwa, a network engineer, tweets @responficient11.