The Kara bridge at Isheri area of Ogun State, is notorious for its traffic gridlock where travellers spend hours, on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway. The bridge head of the road is also home to the popular Kara cattle market. But beyond the cows, VINCENT KURAUN reports that there are dwellers who have turned the filthy under-bridge into their homes.
Many surprises await newcomer customers at Kara Cattle Market, Isheri, Ogun State like Musa, who slipped on human faeces during his last visit to the market.
This happened while he was attempting to cross to the other side of the market, which hosts traders dealing in all sorts of livestock. He had visited the market located on the border between Lagos and Ogun States in search of cheaper rams.
“I slipped on human faeces deposited at the median of the expressway,” Musa narrated while sharing his experience at the market with Sunday Tribune. “The faeces and mud spattered on my legs as I attempted to regain my balance.”
While decrying the terrible condition of the market, Musa wondered why such a market would be reduced to slums, shanties and squatter communities.
He added: “The area is an eyesore right from the newly constructed expressway as the road is littered with human faeces and all kinds of waste.”
Welcome to Kara Cattle Market
Arguably the most popular cattle market in South-Western Nigeria. What typically identifies the market for many is the Kara Bridge, which was constructed by the Murtala Mohammed-led military administration but commissioned by General Olusegun Obasanjo.
The area is popular among many travellers entering or exiting Lagos State from the Eastern, Southern and Northern parts of Nigeria because of its notoriety for traffic congestion, which is sometimes induced during festivities.
During Islamic festivities such as Eid-ul-Fitr and Eid-ul-Kabir, the Kara Cattle Market is usually turned into a hive of activities as Muslims from neighbouring states converge on the market to purchase rams, goats, cows and other livestock which will be offered as sacrifice for the respective celebration.
Apart from livestock, sellers of other varieties of foodstuffs, particularly pepper, have also strategically positioned themselves close to the livestock traders to court market goers and shoppers.
Even beyond the festive period, the market plays host to an array of livestock and foodstuffs that continue to attract people all year-round.
Aside the hustle and bustle that goes on around the market, one other thing many customers and shoppers usually decry when sharing their experiences is the stench and filth that characterise the market and its surroundings.
When Sunday Tribune visited the market, the experience was not different from that of Musa. The roads leading to the market were terrible, full of mud and in messy condition and some makeshift tents have been planted by the roadside where some of the cattle traders live.
Those who spoke with Sunday Tribune attributed the high cost of housing and accommodation as the major factors that forced them to live in makeshift tents in the area.
Life under Kara Bridge
Recall that in March 2022, the former Minister of Works and Housing, Babatude Fashola, during one of his inspections of bridges in Lagos, directed squatters and those carrying out commercial and criminal activities under the bridges to vacate or get ready to face the full wrath of the law, but findings by Sunday Tribune, however, show that it is business as usual under the Kara bridge.
Apart from cattle traders, the bridge houses different kinds of people, including cart pushers, commercial motorcyclists, waste recyclers, roadside hawkers, among others.
But how did these squatters get to live under the Kara bridge, despite the filth, mud and stench?
A motorcyclist, who identified himself as Ali, told Sunday Tribune he came to Lagos State in a cattle trailer and has been living under the bridge since 2021 because he couldn’t afford to rent a decent house in the area.
“I have a spot down the bridge where I pass the night,” Ali said. “This motorcycle is what sustains me here. I operate within the market and its environs and sometimes when there is traffic on the bridge, we carry people to Berger area,” he narrated.
‘Once you can speak Hausa, you’re considered a community member’
Another squatter, Yakubu, who sells sachet water and engages in menial jobs around the market told Sunday Tribune that he found a home under the bridge when he arrived from the North. According to him, he fled the North after the Boko Haram attack that led to the death of his parents and some relatives.
Since he had no one he could stay with in Lagos or money to rent a place for himself, the Kara under-bridge was a very attractive option for him.
“I was able to make friends with some squatters with tents along the river bank. “Sometimes, I sleep in their tents, but whenever they have visitors, maybe their relatives, I seek shelter under the bridge or inside some of the vehicles parked around.”
Like Yakubu, some other squatters in the market also had no particular job they were doing. “Some of us sell sachet water,” another squatter told Sunday Tribune, adding that many others like him would just move around the market and its environs for any available menial jobs they could do and get paid.
“Some of us hawk sachet water and other items on the expressway during the day and retire down the bridge at night or inside some of the vehicles that are parked around,” the squatter said, explaining further that why it was easier for many of them to be allowed to live there was because of their tribe. “Once you can speak Hausa, you are considered a community member. You are welcome to stay as long as you want. So long as you are not encroaching on others,” he said.
“It is very common to identify someone that is new here because they all know themselves, you are welcome to sleep anywhere as long as you are not intruding in other people’s businesses.”
Both Ali and Yakubu, however, declined to respond to queries on how he and others, who dwell under the bridge, cope without modern toilet facilities and pipe-borne water.
Some squatters sighted during Sunday Tribune’s visit were seen smoking cigarettes and marijuana. High wooden tables, presumably used for sleeping littered everywhere while some squatters were seen setting up mosquito nets not minding the grime and stench of the marshy environment.
Managing the Filth and Stench
In spite of the stench and filth, the market leaders have emplaced rules and regulations which, Sunday Tribune learnt are binding on the under-bridge squatters as well as other traders in the market. To this end, leaders in the market had built an office beside one of the huge pillars supporting the bridge and very close to the Ogun river. According to one of the squatters who spoke to Sunday Tribune, most decisions affecting the market are usually taken in the office by the leaders, claiming that though their situation and the market environment is terrible they have become blind to the deplorable condition in the market and under-bridge as they have nowhere to go.
“The squatters under the bridge face all kinds of experiences as a result of the terrible condition of the area, especially the muddy and terrible surroundings. Our situation becomes worse whenever it rains. The surroundings will become more terrible that one will require a kind of special boot to walk in the area.”
He disclosed that one can link the other side of the road under the bridge. “Under the bridge, you can link both sides of Kara Cattle Market and there are many activities that take place down the bridge in spite of the mud and filth,” he explained.
Recall that as a result of the traffic gridlock at Kara end of the Lagos- Ibadan expressway, particularly during festive periods, the administration of Senator Ibikunle Amosun as Ogun State governor, had made plans to relocate the Kara market to the Ogere area of the state. But that plan died immediately Amosun ended his tenure as governor and so was the huge investment made to build another market at Ogere. The successor-government of Prince Dapo Abiodun showed no interest in continuing the project.
Today, the proposed Ogere International Cattle Market has become a corpse with its carcass being feasted upon on a daily basis by cannibals and vandals. The huge money expended on the project by the government has been laid to waste.
Asked if the plan to relocate the market is still in place, Assistant General Secretary of the cattle traders at the market, Mohammed Sani Usman, said the issue of relocation had been dealt with.
“The issue of relocation has long been dropped by the Ogun State government,” Usman explained, adding that both the management of the market and government had reached a common ground on issues affecting the market.
“There is a very good cordial relationship between us and the government. The Ogun State government has given the management of the market some rules for staying there which the management has accepted and implemented all of them,” Usman said.
Speaking on the efforts being made by the government and the market management to improve the condition of the market, Usman said management had started putting enabling structures in place.
“The management of the market is putting everything possible to improve the living condition of the people and the entire environment. If you look at the market, there are so many projects that have been done to develop the market,” he said adding more efforts would still be made.
On the issue of environmental pollution arising from indiscriminate disposal of wastes from cow dung, unused animal feeds, human faeces, among others, Usman disclosed that the market leaders were already collaborating with the state environmental agency to tackle wastes disposal. “We collect waste bins from Ogun State Environmental Agency, which we have stationed at different areas in the market. Whenever the bins are full, the agency will remove and replace them with new ones,” he said, promising that very soon, the situation of the market would change for good.
Sunday Tribune reports that over time, incidents of robbery have been reported to have taken place on the Kara bridge. In several reported instances, armed robbers were accused of taking advantage of the traffic on the bridge to rob unsuspecting travellers and motorists.
Most of the suspects, it was learnt usually jumped off the road, and disappeared under the bridge after carrying out their nefarious activities. Other reports claimed that the hoodlums hid under the bridge from where they launched attacks on motorists whenever the traffic had built up in the area.
When Sunday Tribune asked the market leader if their members were involved in the robberies recorded in the area, Sani, vehemently refuted any claim linking the under-bridge squatters to crimes during gridlock. According to him, none of their members/squatters was involved in such crimes.
“Let me clarify this, it is not our own Kara. There is another Kara, on the Long Bridge before you get to Wawa. That is where such things occur. There used to be another Kara there, if you recall”, he explained.
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