Nigeria is a country that never ceases to amaze all of us, it’s the gift that keeps on giving whether we like it or not. My heart is filled with anger when I think of what happens tomorrow, of the thousands of self-employed Nigerians that will find themselves jobless, of investors that will find the value of their investment halved, of the thousands of dependents that will be unable to go to school because daddy can’t make money because some s*** politicians decided to wake up one morning and ban okada and tricycles, looping Max.ng, Gokada and Oride into the midst, in direct contravention of the Lagos state transport law.
Of all said arguments that support the law, no one is more infuriating than the one that came from the horse’s mouth, the Lagos state government. It says and I quote
“Our Youths no longer learn the trades we used to be proud of- Tailoring, bricklaying, printing, painting and others. Now we get artisans from neighbouring countries. Okada is not an enduring trade.”
Of all reasons to give for the ban on okada and tricycles, This reason is the most unreasonable of all. For a state that prides itself on it’s faux mega status it is disappointing that a statement like this would leave the hallowed chambers of its information department.
We cannot entrepreneur our way to success in Nigeria when we have politicians who have lost touch of the reality on ground, whose very young advisers in government have no concern for the poor who make up a vast number of the electorate and a afraid of speaking power to their masters for fear they will lose their daily bread. Our politicians live in ivory towers driven around in motorcades and do not know the daily suffering of the poor. By this singular move, they do not know they have effectively doubled the crime rate in the city, the very scourge they were trying to prevent will come back and bite them hard in the ass.
As I prepare for sleep this night, I am preparing the curses I will be muttering in my heard for each unnecessary step I will have to take to reach my workplace tomorrow because of this ban.
