THE MODERN LAGOS CITY. AMBODE IS WORKING. OSHODI NEW PHASE

LAGOS NIGERIA, is Nigeria largest city by population. According to Wikipedia, from 2006 population census. Lagos state had a population of about 8million with population density of 6,871/km2.

Lagos city sprawls Ireland from the gulf of guinea to the Lagos lagoon.

Lagos is a home for national museum Lagos.

The focus of this writing is about the busiest area in Lagos. OSHODI to be precise.

If really you know Lagos, or you have visited Lagos before. Either as a tourist or a traveler, you must have been told to be careful while passing oshodi or to suspend your travel if its night already and you are going to make a stop at Oshodi.

There are areas where one has to watch his back at regular intervals especially at night.

Oshodi is a common area for street urchins fondly called “area boys” and pick-pockets. This area is very dangerous mostly early in the morning and at night. There is always a clash between two factions of hoodlums over collection of levies.

 Six years ago, this oshodi is a no go area for novices once the time clocks 10pm up.

The able Governor Akinwunmi Ambode is seriously battling the scourge of crime in the state. He has bought vehicles and other equipment that will help in solving crime in the city and Oshodi and environs are not left out.

Oshodi now is going on a reconstruction phase towards the dream of making Lagos a mega city.

The reconstruction phase is not just raising of structures in Oshodi, but well-armed securities were mounted in every hook and crannies of Oshodi making it safer than diving out of plane with a parachute. Lol, funny right? But that’s the truth because I’m a witness to that.

I once arrived to by 1:00am in the morning on 7^th October 2017, and I couldn’t find a bus or taxi to take me to my destination and I spent the night at Oshodi. I didn’t experience what my brother went through in the hands of hoodlums back in 2014.

Many crimes committed in oshodi today are captured live by a mobile CCTV mounted at the center of Oshodi, which makes it easy for investigative officers.

Oshodi residents will no longer bear the grunt of crimes committed in oshodi.  

“Who says Governor Akinwunmi Ambode is not working?

Words alone can’t explain the speed at which the structures are been erected.

More than two hundred roads have been constructed and all of them in one way or the other makes it easy to connect to oshodi. 

The new phase of oshodi is a beautiful sight to behold.

In less than a year, Oshodi must have been transformed to a heaven.

MONEY INDEED CAN’T BUY LIFE, I WATCHED HIM DIE.

Yesterday, I spent the last penny I had in my pocket and the last in the bank trying to save a life, still the life was lost on the process of saving it.

As at exactly 8pm yesterday 15^th of October 2017, at IJAYE bus stop Lagos state Nigeria.

Mr Afolabi Kolawole met his end. While trying to cross the express, (though there is a pedestrian bridge there) he was knocked down by a speeding motorcycle. He was a plumbing engineer.

Now here comes the reason why I’m writing this article.

I’m a traveller and at times a travellers life is not all about visiting beautiful places, taking pictures and enjoying brighter views from a 5star hotels in the beautiful cities. A traveller at times does a lot of charity work and at times help to save life if he can.

In all these, a traveller sometimes have a success story to tell and sometime a sad one.

Just like yesterday I travelled to Lagos to visit a friend and also to visit places I have not being to in Lagos. When I left my friend’s house on getting to the junction where I will board a bus going to ogun state Nigeria. I saw a spot where almost hundred people gathered and some were screaming JESUS JESUS and some GOD, GOD. I got confused and I now asked one the people standing what the problem is because I was unable to figure out why they were shouting Jesus. Then he told me that “bike don knock person down” (somebody has been knocked down by a motorcycle). Now I got more confused why people will just gather and be shouting Jesus while the accident victim is on the express loosing tons of blood. Now here comes my question if it is ignorance of what to do or were they afraid of what to do? So I managed to make my way to the centre and behold Mr Afolabi was losing lots of blood and was bleeding inside his brain which was unknown to us until when I took him  to hospital. Now how funny is it, people shouting JESUS and GOD while they supposed to take the injured to hospital.  Immediately I abandoned my mission of going back to ogun state and I started begging the tricycle drivers at the junction to help take him to hospital, virtually all of them asked me the same question if he is my relative of which I have not met Mr Afolabi before neither do I know him from Adam. So after begging for almost twenty minutes one of them decided to take me and Mr Afolabi to a nearby hospital (Longing Hospital Ijaye). On getting to the hospital thank God the hospital managed to give him first aid treatment and referred us to General hospital at ILEPO. The journey wasn’t funny nor easy as written. Because we faced many huddles on the road. People’s negligence, begging road users to slow down so that we can pass and encountering a soldier in a bus who don’t want to listen to me explaining to his driver that we have emergency that he should create a space for us to pass the traffic jam. General hospital ILEPO is not a specialist hospital. On getting to ILEPO general hospital, they received him immediately and administered first aid treatment and also brought some machines I don’t know their names and connect to him in other for him to breathe well. And drip was given to him. All these while we were busy trying to contact his family or friends. Thanks to God he didn’t lock his phone with security code (don’t ever lock your phone with code in case of emergency). In his phone no number was actually stored properly except for his co-workers their numbers were properly stored like “Kunle Tiller”. When Kunle was contacted that his colleague had accident he replied that he is not living in his (Afolabi) area. Then I didn’t give up on trying the numbers in his phone until we contacted one IYA (Mrs) who contacted his daughter. While at General hospital ILEPO we bought temporary form and the doctor prescribed some drugs and finally he told us that we have to take him to LASUTH (Lagos state university teaching hospital) at IKEJA, the capital of Lagos state. The daughter arrived by 10:30pm in the hospital at ILEPO. I begged the hospital management if they can borrow us their Ambulance but they refused and told me that it is not done that way. Thanks to God the Tricycle driver has decided to join the help though he will still be paid by me later in the night. So we took him together with the daughter to LASUTH, a journey that took us 40minutes. While on our way to LASUTH I noticed that he stopped breathing. But I can’t tell the daughter because I have been exhausted, I can’t be able to control her on the road if she starts crying and rolling on the road. So on getting to LASUTH they doctors and nurses responding quickly although that was late already. Looking at the doctor’s face I can say he is already crying but he can’t show it because it is his profession. Looking at him he is very tired because they were attending to emergency situation when we arrived. He asked me, are you his family? I said no I was just a passer-by who decided to bring him to hospital. But now you can call me his family He said to me that the man is dead. After a while the daughter overheard my conversation with one his relative and she burst out crying. Uncontrollably she was shouting BABA MI OTI KU. (My father is dead).

Mr Afolabi Kolawole was confirmed dead at 12am 16^th of October 2017.

Since I was born I have not witnessed somebody die. I have seen somebody get shot but he didn’t die but yesterday was me looking at somebody while he gave up the ghost.

All the emergency response team we called right from the spot of the accident none responded, and none called back to confirm our report.

He has been confirmed dead and his family is with him and my money didn’t buy his life back. I was disappointed and unhappy. That’s when I realized that I was still in Lagos. I started looking for a way to find a bus going to ogun state. With blood stains on my hand and clothes nobody offered me a ride until I found a place I washed out some of the blood stains. Finally I got a bus that took me to my destination and I got home by 1pm.

I tried to save a life and lost it.

My money couldn’t buy his life back.

I watched him die.

But that’s not the end of the road I said to myself.

Time to wash the stained clothes. 

NO NIGERIAN SPEAKS NIGERIA

For years I have being a person that gets fascinated about places, history and historical places, people and people’s ways of life, their believes and what their believes stands for. I have kept records of places I have been to, my experiences and encounters, foods, games, music, animals and I have tried to make comparisons and differentiations. For me, this is writing of modern history According to my journal, my country is a continent, the countries in it need to be surfed and tell the stories of their inhabitants. “Nigeria is too big for one to assume that few Nigerians you meet defines every Nigerian”. This is a world to explore. My home Nigeria is a world that harbours more than 300 tribes and more than 500 languages. This reminds me of a first time visitor to Nigeria I met in 2016 at the airport and the funny question he asked me was if I speak Nigeria. Silly right? But he is right in his own thinking and its left for me to explain to him why no Nigerian speaks Nigeria, but we speak languages in Nigeria as Nigerians. And meeting me doesn’t mean he has met all Nigerians and knowing me has not given him full knowledge of Nigerians. Therefore, browsing, flipping and reading through my journal, I can tell everyday life and encounter one can possibly pass through in Nigeria.

Check for updates every day.