We’ve started picking rickety yellow buses off the road —Govt

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We’ve started picking rickety yellow buses off the road —Govt

On Monday, the Lagos State Ministry of Transport will commence its safety sensitisation campaign week and in the course of the event, the final decision on the planned phasing out of the popular yellow buses will be taken. It is not that operators and residents of the state who patronise them are being ambushed with the coming decision. In fact, the ministry’s leadership told Saturday Tribune that some of the rickety ones which have become death merchants on the road are already in the custody of the government agency responsible for ensuring safety on highways. But the coming mopping up, according to Mrs Bolanle Ogunmola, Public Affairs Officer of the ministry, is expected to restore sanity to public transportation in the state, considering that the yellow buses, popularly known as danfo, are descendants of the equally popular but now defunct Molue.

With the coming decision to rid the state of rickety buses which incidentally mostly serve the Lagos passengers more than any of their contemporaries like LAGBUS and BRT, the question on many lips is if there would be no transportation emergency across the state, particularly the mainland axis, where danfo is king.

Those worrying about the likely unpleasant fallout of such mopping up are pointing fingers to the derelicts that many LAGBUS and BRT vehicles have become despite being government-backed. Apart from being a source of riding worry for many passengers, rickety danfo, LAGBUS and BRT long buses are also fast becoming death merchants with the most recent being the painful run-over of the image maker of Air Peace airline by a BRT bus which steering wheel suddenly pulled out in motion. That avoidable tragedy and many more across the state are what Ogunmola said the state government was determined to end as it reportedly continued to drum it to the ears of owners of the insecure vehicles who are mostly members of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) that such buses can’t remain on the road.

Rickety danfo a nuisance –Govt

The verdict of the state government on danfo was damning. It acknowledged the rickety yellow buses as a nuisance on the road in the state, saying it had since commenced efforts at sending them off the road. Ogunmola equally told Saturday Tribune that next week’s forum would be used to educate properly, drivers and vehicle owners on the need to ensure that rickety buses were kept off the roads in the state.

“We have since been picking some of the rickety buses off the roads but the date for commencement of the full implementation of the exercise would be reached at the Safety Week which will commence on Monday. The Safety Week is an annual event. The week would be an opportunity to educate the drivers and vehicle owners on the need to take off the roads, all these rickety buses, which will not only be for the safety of passengers but their own safety as well,” she said.

Once upon a Molue

Once upon a time, Molue ruled Lagos roads as the lion rules the jungle. That was the big yellow Mercedes Benz buses called 911. The old, rickety but solid vehicles with their “49 passengers sitting and 99 others standing” capacity, to borrow a few lines from the late Afro Beat king, Fela Anikulapo Kuti, are today almost gone.

With inscriptions like “Atlas motors” or “Ali Balogun” written across their sides, each bus was also adorned with religious and nationalistic artworks.

Some had philosophical inscriptions such as “Slow and steady”, “No food for lazy man” and “The Grace of God” painted on them while others also had quotations from the holy books, depending on the faith of the owner. Records show that only two auto companies are the manufacturers of those yellow buses that once adorned the streets of Lagos. They are Mercedes Benz with their 911 model and Bedford.

It took panel beaters with artistic minds to redesign Mercedes Benz or Bedford truck into buses that could be used for transportation.

But despite its strong built, no Molue bus was allowed to cross any of the three bridges linking the Mainland part of Lagos with the Island for safety reasons. These are the Third Mainland, Eko and Carter bridges.

Then came the red-paint LAGBUS being managed by the LAGBUS Asset Management Limited.

It was a new dawn and yes, people still stand but with dignity.

The first phase of the Lagos BRT was opened on 17 March 2008 and was initiated by the government of Senator Bola Tinubu.

It was believed that the introduction of BRT bus by the state government had finally driven the nail into the coffin of the Molue bus. But is the era of Molue over? The answer lies with responses gleaned by Saturday Tribune from operators, regulators and passengers.

BRT and bloody tales

Indeed, the story of mass transit buses has assumed a new twist. As a former governorship aspirant in Lagos State, Mr Segun Agbaje, put it, the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) scheme was a good initiative but the buses were not being well maintained.

The good idea behind the BRT scheme and the succour it brought to Lagos residents are fast eroding due to low maintenance culture. However, stakeholders are hopeful that the newly acquired blue buses under the management of Primero Transport Services Limited will change the narrative and usher in a better mass transit experience for Lagos residents.

One avoidable death caused by rickety BRT which is still reverberating is the case of Mr Christian Ejiroghene Iwarah. It is one among many. When Iwarah woke up from bed in high spirit on June 8, 2019, his major aim was to get to work on time to attend to a backlog of official engagements calling his attention. Little did he know that death was lurking around the corner.

In other words, if he had been told by a prophet that he would never return home alive, he would have probably dismissed it with a wave of the hand or described such prediction as useless and coming from the darkest pit of hell.

As usual, Iwarah, the erstwhile Corporate Communications Manager of Air Peace Airline, full of life on the very day, left for work to attend to his daily routine of protecting the image of the airline. Unknown to him, there was danger awaiting him at the Mangoro axis of the Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway through a rickety vehicle. After the day’s work, Iwarah dashed into his car in high spirit, satisfied with the level of jobs he had delivered.

And having exchanged pleasantries with his colleagues, he embarked on the journey back home to his family who were anxiously awaiting the return of their breadwinner after the day’s stressful engagement.

Unfortunately, the youthful image maker never made it back home alive. His hope of doing so was truncated abruptly. At Mangoro Bus Stop, a BRT bus was said to have rammed into him at the spot where he parked to fix a minor fault on his car. The driver of the commercial bus, which was said to have suffered a brake failure before ramming into Iwarah, was said to have declared during interrogation that the steering of the BRT bus pulled off which made it difficult for a diesel engine brake to respond immediately.

The late Iwarah’s was one of the numerous avoidable deaths that had befallen many Lagosians at the hands of drivers of rickety vehicles in the metropolis.

Not worthy!

According to findings by Saturday Tribune, apart from rickety BRT buses, close to 80 per cent of commercial vehicles plying the Lagos routes are not road worthy with many lacking safety components required for safe transport.

Confirming this, Lukmon, a bus conductor plying the Egbeda/Oshodi axis, agreed that most of the buses on Lagos roads did not have not only essential safety components but also functional shock absorbers, clutches, steering systems, brakes, oil and other lubricants. Most of the vehicles transporting innocent passengers around Lagos, according to Lukmon, lacked all these components while the few that have them cannot boast of proper maintenance.

“Even 10 per cent of the private cars moving around Lagos,” according to Mr Adewale who works in one of the banks in Victoria Island, are also not road worthy.

Many residents are, however, disagreeing with the conclusion that gross irresponsibility on the part of vehicles owners and drivers are solely responsible for the many moving coffins plying the state roads in the name of mass transit. They were of the opinion that government cannot be asking motorists for road worthiness when most of the roads are just too bad.

Ogundare narrated a nasty experience of his pastor. According to him, “People visit mechanics often just because their vehicles get damaged when they run into or enter gullies right in the middle of the roads. We had an experience last Sunday on the Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway, at Moshalasi/Kollington Bus Stop axis, Agbado- Ijaiye specifically. It involved my senior pastor, Taiwo Laogun. We went on a visit to a bereaved family around Tollgate with his jeep and midway while returning around 2.00 p.m., he entered a big pothole on the highway. It was not that he was speeding because there was heavy traffic at the axis as usual. So, as we moved about 20 meters, steam started coming out from the bonnet (of the vehicle) and we mistook it for overheating even though no such indication on the dashboard. “So, we parked and stayed for about 40 minutes for cooling. But surprisingly, the water was pouring out underneath as we were filling the radiator. The man could not get home with the car that day. The radiator had been badly damaged. Now, he is looking for N35,000 for a replacement.”

The story above mirrors the prevalent sentiment among inter and intra-state transporters. Their defence is, however, beyond bad roads.

‘Why we drive rickety buses’

A staff member of LAGBUS who preferred not to be mentioned as he was not permitted to speak for the company said though buses were occasionally withdrawn for overhauling at various maintenance depots in Bolade, Keffi, Ikorodu and Ketu Toll Gates, there was always the challenge of acquisition of spare parts.

“The management is always complaining of delay in getting spare parts. You know, we do not produce spare parts here in Nigeria and we have to rely on the ones coming in from abroad and that can take time because when they even arrive, it takes time to clear at the ports,” he told Saturday Tribune.

To him, since Nigeria does not manufacture all the buses here, there is time frame between when parts are imported and when they can be cleared. He added that it is difficult to run a LAGBUS economy in an environment that did not manufacture one.

Many commercial bus drivers spoken to by Saturday Tribune attributed the presence of poorly maintained vehicles on the Lagos roads to the failure of law enforcement agencies to implement the rules guiding the status of vehicles that must be used for commercial purposes.

The Lagos Traffic Law regime is designed to protect law-abiding road users. It is also designed to ensure that those who flout any of its stipulations are made to face the consequences of their action so that they can learn their lessons. The traffic management regime is not designed to empower officials of any agency of the state to molest, intimidate, extort or make a lawbreaker out of any Lagos resident/stakeholder through demanding and giving of bribes so as to avoid unsavoury situations. The Lagos traffic rules include: driving without road worthiness which attracts vehicle’s impoundment, driving with worn-out tyres which attracts N30,000 while one way  driving attracts three years imprisonment.

LASTMA, FRSC guilty?

Despite the traffic rules, officials of the agency responsible for ensuring compliance, the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA) and the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), have been accused of failing in their duties. Many commercial bus operators spoken to accused the officials of collecting bribe monies without even checking on the road worthiness of vehicles assigned to them and compromising their roles of checking the status of vehicles plying the roads in the process.

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Aliu, a danfo driver plying Iyana Ipaja-Ayobo route said: “Government should hold its officials responsible for heavy presence of unworthy vehicles around Lagos. Many of them, because of corruption, will rather collect bribes from drivers of such rickety buses and allow them to continue to kill other road users.”

To Aliu, even the government-backed red-painted BRT buses are competing with other yellow buses in constituting nuisance to other road users. The BRT buses are becoming worse than Molue and rapidly turning into death traps, according to Aliu and some other Lagos residents that spoke to Saturday Tribune. Ironically, the alarming high rate at which BRT buses develop faults,  get involved in accidents, catch fire or cause death of residents on Lagos roads has left many doubting if Molue that rarely record such incidents is not a safer mode of transportation.

We only regulate, owners maintain their buses –LAMATA

In a telephone conversation with Saturday Tribune, the Assistant Director, Corporate Communication at the Lagos Metropolitan Area Transport Authority (LAMATA) Kolawole Ojelabi, said the issue of bus maintenance rests at the doorstep of the owners. “Government does not have any role to play in terms checking whether the buses are rickety or not. We have our reporters at the bus centres to report to us if they violate rules that were given to them,” Ojelabi clarified.

Under the amended LAMATA Act 2007, the agency is empowered with responsibilities to coordinate transport policies, programmes and actions of all agencies; maintain and manage the Declared Road Network (DRN), mainly bus public transport routes of about 632 kilometers.

The body also has the responsibility to recommend on route planning and general location of bus shelters, pedestrian ways and bridges; regulate Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) along prioritised corridors; coordinate activities of the State Licensing Authority and all vehicle inspection units; make policy recommendations on public transportation to the governor, including mechanisms for implementation among others.

Though Ogunmola, the Public Affairs Officer of the state Ministry of Transport, ‎concurred that LAMATA has the final say on BRT buses and the ministry dealing only with danfo and their drivers, she disclosed that rickety buses that break down at every major road in Lagos are to be impounded.

Our role concerning rickety buses –FRSC

The Sector Commander of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) in Lagos State, Hyginus Omeje, while speaking on the increasing number of rickety buses on Lagos roads, said the agency had been impounding such vehicles. He, however, pointed out that it was not the statutory duty of the FRSC to issue Road Worthiness Certificate to vehicles.

The FRSC boss said the Vehicle Inspection Office was responsible for the issuance of such a certificate and that FRSC was only impounding vehicles that were technically and mechanically deficient.

Omeje also said that the fine for such rickety buses “is around N5 000” but emphasised that the important thing “is to ensure that such deficiency is rectified in the premises of the FRSC before the vehicle is released to the driver.”

The FRSC boss said: “We do impound vehicles that are mechanically deficient and we ensure that such deficiency is rectified before the vehicle is given back to the driver. It is not the duty of FRSC to issue Road Worthiness Certificate to drivers. It is the duty of the VIO but we impound vehicles that are mechanically deficient.”

Residents speak

Emman Ola thinks the coming policy would hurt but wonders why residents hardly use the hotlines displayed on the LAGBUS and BRT buses to put their complaints on record. Though the average complaint calls per week sought by Saturday Tribune could not be accessed with LAMATA, findings showed that many users of the troubled mass transit buses prefer to grumble aloud and around instead of placing formal complaints with the regulators.

“People should speak up before major tragedies happen and we moan and mourn. Avoidable deaths should be prevented though the ban would be easy on the residents who have come to depend on these danfo people. What can the few good buses do with millions of road users moving about daily? It is a tough call,” he said.

High hopes?

Last year, the Managing Director, Primero Transport Services Limited, Fola Tinubu, signed a Memorandum of Understanding with one of the biggest bus manufacturers in the world, Yutong, to establish a bus assembly plant in the Epe area of the state. The plant, according to him, will go into mass production of high-capacity buses and these buses are expected to ply the new BRT corridor being constructed around the Oshodi-Abule Egba area as well as existing corridors.

Primero currently has about 434 buses conveying 150,000 people daily, with a target of 2,000 buses that will give it the capacity to convey one million passengers daily, Tinubu said. At the company’s main depot located at Majidun in Ikorodu, there are ultramodern maintenance facilities readily available.

However, will the promise of one man sustain the hope of millions?

We’ve started picking rickety yellow buses off the road —Govt
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