If you are walking on the pedestrian bridge in Oshodi, and you hear the “toot toot” of the train engine, stop, look down and watch the mayhem that follows. Passengers arranged on the rooftop like ants on a cube of sugar like it was the upper segment of the train. You aren’t afraid that they will fall off. You are transfixed in what is an obscene kind of systemic ineptitude. It is not a normal experience. It depicts the abnormality of a stoic, decayed system, one passenger after the other.
These people I just described are called rooftop riders which Mr Jerry Oche, the Lagos District Manager, Nigeria Railway Corporation (NRC) has also described as miscreants. According to him, these rooftop riders, make innocent passengers uncomfortable and train rides insecure. He also added that the corporation will increase the fine price of illegal train riders to N100,000, as opposed to 25,000 which the current fine price is.
“The fine is just a way to discourage people from riding [on] the rooftop of the train. We have charged 36 out of over 100 suspects to court recently and the clampdown will continue.”
This is not bad at all, considering that overload on trains, by people who sit calmly on a moving train like they were shooting a movie can cause its derailment and possibly, kill thousands.
But will this fine answer the problems of the “how” and “why”? Which is, how do these riders get to the top of the roof, and why is this even an option for them?
Trains are a cheap mode of transportation, and most importantly a faster mode of transport as cars and buses will most likely get stuck in the thick wave of the metropolitan traffic.
The rail lines in Lagos have become makeshift shops and pedestrian pathways. A train passes, and the next thought is “they exist”? This is to highlight the scarcity of these trains in the first place. Their scarcity, mixed with the pungent mismanagement, has orchestrated a reality where people simply have to hop on the roof of a train to get home quickly and, sometimes, free-of-charge.
The poor management of the NRC is no secret and could be an obvious reason for the emergence of rooftop riders. If there were proper train stations, subways, proper ticket booking platforms, and more trains, I fail to see how “miscreants” can find their way into the train station, to embark on rooftop rides.
This mismanagement could be easily attributed to lack of funds, embezzlement, and disregard of the NRC in general. This is not the only sector that has been disregarded, as the Nigerian Transportation system has been in a state of emergency for a long time. BRT buses (Lagos buses) have increasingly become over-capacitated, and the face of public transport around Nigeria (trains, busses) becomes more grotesque with each passing day.
The N100,000 fine might stop these rooftop riders, but it doesn’t fix the problem of inadequate transportation problems plaguing the nation which are: too many people and not enough buses or trains.
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