Trifter

Driving to some people is a hobby. People chose to drive around to get some fresh air as they relax while doing a bit of thinking and rejuvenating. Some others, drive because they have to move from a location to a different location to meet-up with appointment and deadlines. Another percentage of drivers pick up their car keys just to terrorise other road-users.

Now you must be catching my drift? You might have driven for ages and plied every route in New York where drivers are known globally for their unpredictability and theatrics, but driving in Lagos is a different kettle of fish all together. To start with, I have a revelation to make here. Take it. It has been proved that no car or truck is plying Lagos roads without scars, dents and tears as a result of the devilry of this group of terrorist drivers in Lagos.

This is so considering the fact that there is no seriousness on the part of the Lagos State government to regulate the training of every driver wannabe before they hit the roads. Any boy that can engage his father’s or mother’s car to a reverse or use gear one to move forward is already hailed by friends and family members as a pilot. From every corner of Nigeria, people are trooping into Lagos on daily basis for the proverbial golden fleece albeit the indigenous one, in their thousands. Report released by the Road Safety Commission put the figure of these new Lagosians at over fifty thousand everyday.

A visit to any of the markets in Lagos will convince you that this claim is true. You’ll see nothing but sea of heads. When they arrive in search of greener pastures, the first thing they will see is the unavailability of jobs. The majority of them are unskilled and wouldn’t fit into the requirements expected of them to pick such low-paying jobs that are mostly temporal. When reality strikes them, they get to understand the nature of life in Lagos. The motto guiding Lagos is “No one cares” about you. They start sleeping underneath the bridges and motor-parks dotting the entire landscape of the city.

As transportation is grossly inadequate in Lagos, smart Lagosians usually purchase some second-hand buses imported from different places in Europe to cash in on government’s inadequacy in this vibrant sector of Lagos economy.

Heaven help you when you get into Lagos roads with any one of these fifth-rated terrorists behind the wheels. They are as evil as the siren-blaring government cars, bought with the tax-payers money and driven by trained mad dogs.

Everyday Lagosians have their hearts threatening to jump out of their body whenever a danfo driver of their government siren-blaring agbero driver is behind the wheels dangerously manoeuvring his car behind them. Most times its either you drive your car into the open gutter or you are given a debasing treatment for not getting out of the way of a government functionary in the army or in the public sector by their overzealous security detail.

Driving is dangerous to every road user in Lagos and it will take only a modern man sent by God Himself as governor in this megacity to turn things around by revamping the waterways, introduce the light rail transport systems, repair the ubiquitously potholes ridden roads and construct new bridges to save Lagosians from themselves. All these will get many Lagos drivers off the roads as they use other means of transportation to get on with their hectic way of life.