MY BRT EXPERIENCE

My o my! These were the words that dropped out of my mouth the fateful Wednesday of last week. My car had developed an engine fault and I could not risk driving it in the ubiquitous traffic that Lagos has become known for. I was running late for a meeting on the Island; a bead of sweat broke out on my face, it was 8 O'clock in the morning. So I decided to take a ride in the mammy-wagon (gratuitously called BRT in our local parlance). As Lagosians, we love speed and for the first time, we are able to move from one part of the city to another unhindered by gridlocks (or so I thought). The dedicated corridors guarantee that passengers in BRT vehicles get to their destinations without undue delay.

BRT Buses taking after their predecessors

Consequently, I was compelled to jostle against a large crowd who were all headed to the Island from the Surulere bus station, I got a seat with the day's newspapers and other encumbrances clasped to my chest. Few minutes later, the driver mounted the bus to confirm if the bus was ‘tight enough’ but not without raining obscenities on different passengers and bystanders in an alphabetical fashion did he then rev his already running engine to hit the road.

The BRT bus is for the poor or so they say; the irony is that it is the place to encounter the richest expressions of the Nigerian mind, without the pretensions that we all live with.

Inside the BRT with its slightly elevated height, I looked down on the surroundings from the Western Avenue Bridge towards the Lagos lagoon and soaked in the environment with the free drama on offer. The cacophony of fellow passenger voices was of people analyzing the elections of 2015, the Goodluck-Sambo ticket, and the issues that are raging on in Rivers State. I loved the touch with reality and simplicity. But suddenly the rhythmic movement of the bus stopped - the engine went dead silent! Of course, the bus had broken down.

The lack of maintenance culture is ever so prevalent and present in Nigeria. We disembarked without any arrangement whatsoever being made to refund the money we had spent; we were at the middle of no-where, high and dry. From the location where we had the break-down I could see BRT buses littering the road and in fact causing obstruction. The BRT buses were no different from their Molue or Eko transport predecessors. The buses were in such deplorable state that I asked myself aloud, ‘what were you thinking?’

I have come to the realization that anything that has to do with the masses (the new name for the poor) is taken with levity. Too many things don’t make sense to me. The Government and their agents make all the money and don’t think of business continuity and customer care. Shame!

In any case, a danfo, always the intriguing personality, with a conductor standing at the tail board without a shirt with sweat glistening on his back showed up chanting CMS! CMS!! I hopped unto it saying prayers silently that ‘all must be well’ as this new team began spitting out their expletives. What a day, what a country.