Our roads, our woes

SOME things blight a nation, a people. I will say deplorable roads are one of them. Some things blight Nigeria, of a fact, many things… Decrepit state of the so-called federal roads is one of them. All over the country, the song is the same. Sixty-one years after we began to rule ourselves and gradually gnaw our country to ruin, we appear drained and worse-off than when we started at independence. Nigerians cry daily about basic things and the cry is accentuated when we see that such basic things we lack in abundance are routine provisions in most other countries about our age in independence.

During Dr Kayode Fayemi’s first term as Governor of Ekiti State, the Speaker of the Gauteng Parliament, Madam Lindwe Mazeko, and a delegation of the Parliament, visited the state in 2012. During the visit, Ms Mazeko, in one of her sessions with journalists, said one thing that struck her as she made her way to Ekiti upon their arrival in Nigeria is our roads. She spoke with huge dollops of diplomacy.

However, it was still easily noticeable that she was not impressed with and by us and what she saw. She might have set her sight on wide, well-manicured expressways. Alas, she didnt see that. She must have been deeply disappointed, but she found it impervious to say so as a diplomat. She would have shrugged and say something like ‘mba la nke we…’ My grandmother said that a lot when she had some new, disappointing encounters. When we talked about it and I remain stuck in it, dwelling in regret on the disappointment, my grandmother will shrug and say ‘mba la nke we’ (a people and their ways) to shut me up and end the discussion. Through that, I learnt that a people would always have their ways – good or bad.

We are still in that mire of bad, depression-inducing roads. What the visitor and a parliament speaker from South Africa said and what we have been saying do not amount to anything.

One stand out example of a road suffering this neglect or utter lack of care is the Umuahia – Ikot Ekpene Road in Abia State. There are many other roads in the state that are shameful, especially in Aba township and its environs. Aba’s case of dirt and bad roads is on another level of shamelessness. Abandoned Aba is a matter of concern to the masses of the state, but not to successive state governments and sundry political leaders, particularly in the zone. However, Umuahia – Ikot Ekpene Road is a federal road the connects Abia and Akwa Ibom states. It’s the shortest route between the states and it is the only road that services the over 60 towns, villages and communities in Ikwuano Local Government Area of Abia State.

The people of Ikwuano, beginning from Umudike all the way to Ariam Elu-Elu are victims of the road. The people of the local government area are enslaved by the road and are shackled  to its perpetual disrepair. And to make the case more pathetic, there is no alternative! The sadness expressed daily by commuters on the Umuahia – Ikot Ekpene Road kills joy, and this includes some Ndume communities of Umuahia, who have a share in the misfortune of the road. Last week, a female student of Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike lost her life in an accident at one of the numerous failed portions of the road. Following the death, tempers flared, flared and flared and calmed; names were called and fingers were pointed. The avoidable painful death of the young girl and the angry reactions to it compelled the Abia State government to take steps towards palliative repair of the worst portions of the road. A life had to go to get the government to pour sand and dust and stones into the craters and pools on the deplorable road. We hope that the road would be fixed for the fact that it needs fixing and not because a life was lost. And it is saddening when the number of lives lost to bad roads in Nigeria is imagined. The people of Ikwuano have been debating among themselves on various platforms about the road. Those who have access to data have been calling out their political leaders, sometimes in uncharitable language. These political leaders too are responding. They are also expressing their hopes and frustrations about the road while the people are nursing a hope of a repair.

The Umuahia – Ikot Ekpene road is in the South East. But the road woes are beyond just one road in the inner recesses of the Igbo heartland. The woes of Eastern Nigeria include the effects of the agitation by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). The daily traffic gridlock in the major roads in the East are as a result of the activities of IPOB. Soldiers, policeman, civil defence corps, customs, local vigilante groups all mount roadblocks and each of these security checkpoints is a source of a different kind of traffic jam.

For instance, soldiers at the military checkpoint in Ihiala, Anambra State, make all passengers, including trailer motor boys,  to disembark and walk a distance off the checkpoint before resuming their trip. All these are coupled with the deplorable roads and the fear of criminals. These form a potpourri of worries for travellers, some of whom are first time visitors to the region.

The hundreds of journalists who were in Abia State have seen how some of the things Nigeria is doing are done in the East. Impressions have been created and opinions formed. Traffic gridlock is caused by a military checkpoint, manned by unfriendly soldiers. Numerous police checkpoints from Ijebu Ode to Ore to Benin form the bulk of the encumbrance and the basis for the troubles travellers suffer. But we are like the proverbial sick man. The sick is not ashamed, it is the sick man’s relatives that bear the shame.

The suffering, humiliation, loss, injury etc faced by Nigerians and other travellers to the South South and South East are sad and shameful. It should not be. It’s inexplicable and confounding why there would be total blockage of the Shagamu – Ore highway at spaces of not more than one kilometre apart by security agents. And what they do is similar. The need for security on the highway is noted, but the crude method our officers go about it is debilitating. There should be means other than totally blocking the roads and throwing up unnecessary confusion.

Whatever their reason, the nearly 20 checkpoints that dot the road from Ijebu Ode to Ore, a distance of about 180 kilometres, are too many and repetitive. They simpl make travelling cumbersome. And this is nothing compared to the 13 security roadblocks from Ore to Benin City, a distance of about 77 kilometres.

Nigerians deserve better, that includes even the police and other security agents roasting daily in the sun.

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