Residents, traders, commuters and members of the National Union of Road Transport Workers in the Ojodu Berger area have accused the Lagos State Government of being insensitive to their plight regarding the traffic gridlock experienced daily along Kosoko Street due to the parking of commercial buses in the area.
The gridlock, said to be making life unbearable for motorists in the area, especially in the morning and evening during week days, began when the state government banned the commercial bus operators from using their former park.
Kosoko Street is the route through which thousands of residents of Ojodu Abiodun, Yakoyo Ojodu, Alagbole, Akute, Ajuwon, and Denro, amongst others, from the Ifo area of Ogun State, working in Lagos commute to work every day.
The Lagos State Government had recently embarked on the demolition of communities and infrastructure declared as illegal, claiming that the action was to check crime and encourage urban regeneration.
The demolition of the Ojodu Berger Market and the construction of a new motor park, which has remained unoccupied, pushed the commercial bus drivers to Kosoko Street, while some of the traders in the area also resorted to hawking on the street.
In their reactions, some traders and residents of the area, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, berated the government for its alleged insensitivity to their plight.
“Since the demolition of our old market, things have not been easy for us. This new one we managed to build is too small and many of us have been pushed to the street,” one of the traders said.
The state government had, at a stakeholders’ meeting before the eviction, promised to provide a better alternative, or at least, return the commercial bus operators to their former park after the completion of the new motor park.
But the government failed to fulfil its promise, as some of the union executives described the stakeholders’ meeting as “somewhat deceitful”, claiming that the government did not tell them it would not provide them a better alternative.
An Executive member of the Ojodu Berger NURTW, Unit D, Mr. Nosiru Aminu, said, “The government hasn’t done well in this regard. We don’t have a befitting park and that is the reason for the traffic gridlock. If they (the government) provide us a better space, we’ll leave the street. That street is too small for us to contain our buses; we have wives and children to feed. The government should come to our aid.
“There is a vacant space over there, where a filling station was demolished. We can move there and it is big enough to contain us.”
Since the demolition of our old market, things have not been easy for us. This new one we managed to build is too small and many of us have been pushed to the street
Also speaking, Chairman of the unit, Alhaji Kamoru Ishola, urged the government to ease the traffic gridlock in the area by providing a better motor park for their use.
Ishola also urged the state government to make Kosoko Street a one-way drive for those linking the major road through the street, while those driving in should use alternative streets.
Meanwhile Governor Akinwunmi Ambode had, in his second quarter town hall meeting, held on April 21, at the Ojo area of the state, said he did not authorise any market demolition at Ojodu
Berger.
