2015: What I Heard in Lagos Last Week

I was in Lagos last week. I had left Abuja with a 1pm First Nation Airline flight that was de­layed for about 30 minutes and arrived in Lagos some minutes to 3pm. Since I started travelling by air, last week Sunday’s flight to Lagos was my worst experience. The aircraft was just in trouble from takeoff to the time that we landed. The weather was so cruel that at a point the pilot announced that visibility was almost zero but added with muf­fled assurances that ‘it is nothing to worry about.” After scaring the life out of us, the plane surpris­ingly landed with ease as many loudly thanked God for His mercies.

Although most of my ac­tivities in Lagos were con­ducted within the Ikoyi and Victoria Island axis, I took accommodation in the Opebi, Ikeja area. I was therefore in different taxis, shuttling between where I stayed to where I carried out the activities that took me to Lagos; and this was between Sunday and Wednesday when I returned to Abu­ja. In all, I boarded differ­ent taxis 19 times.

As a concerned and pa­triotic citizen, I have pas­sionately followed the political developments in the country as it relates to the 2015 general elec­tions. I was interested also in knowing what is going on in Lagos, the de-facto headquarters of opposition in the coun­try. So, I set out to seek information from the drivers as they picked and dropped me from and to Opebi. After exchang­ing pleasantries and making myself friendly with each driver, I would subtly pose the question, ‘What is happening in Lagos?’ to which most of them gave response that suggests the 2015 election is at the front burner of social life in the city.

“Who do you think would win the governorship election in Lagos State,’ was my usual second question.

Honestly, I had expected that most of the drivers would say that the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its gubernato­rial candidate Ambode would have a landslide. This is in view of the huge media advantage that had always given the impression that Lagos was for the APC. But I was shocked that out of the 19 taxi drivers that I patronised, nine of them told me that Jimi Agbaje of the Peoples Demo­cratic Party (PDP) would win the election outright. Five gave it to the APC while two said they were not interested in who be­comes governor of the state because according to them, PDP or APC, no one would better their lives after the elections. The remaining three guys told me they would prefer Jimi Agbaje but feared Tinubu would rig the process in favour of Ambode.

On why they would pre­fer PDP to APC, those who said Agbaje would win told me that Am­bode was foisted on APC because he was a Bola Tinubu stooge. One of them told me that the APC candidate was once the Accountant General of Lagos State under Ti­nubu’s administration and had issues which were so serious that he was fired when Fashola came to office in 2007, but that Tinubu prevailed on Fashola to give the guy a soft-landing.

Honestly I could not ver­ify the veracity of this allegation against Am­bode from those I asked, but when I asked other drivers, they told me it was the truth that Am­bode had issues concern­ing Lagos State Pension Funds.

One other driver said he was voting for Jimi Agba­je as a protest against the overbearing influence of Tinubu in Lagos. He said Lagos would be liberated from Tinubu once APC is thrown out of power in the State. In addition, majority of the drivers said Jimi Agbaje is very popular with a greater majority of Lagosians because of his down-to-earth style of life and grassroots leaning.

On the March 28 presi­dential contest between President Goodluck Jon­athan and retired Major General Muhammadu Buhari, eight of the driv­ers said they were not in­terested on who wins the election as their primary focus is who would better their lives in Lagos, in view of what one of them described as dubious double tax regime and other unjustifiable levies they pay while struggling to put food on the table of their individual families.

While seven said they would vote for Jonathan, five preferred a Buhari led Presidency come May 29 this year. Surprisingly however, only three out of the 19 taxi drivers feared there would be vi­olence after the elections as the others said nobody would influence them to risk their lives since ac­cording to them, PDP or APC, ‘na dem dem.’

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melahbonaventure@yahoo.com