One constant criticism of leadership in most of Africa is that leadership is not visionary but reactive. Rarely does one find leaders who are capable of envisioning and working for a better future for their societies. Most of them are preoccupied with gaining and maintaining power, usually through cronyism, political loyalty and corruption. Invariably therefore, the main preoccupation of leadership becomes the maintenance of the status. What we call governance here is at best trouble-shooting.
This is what comes to mind when I think about the fate of Lekki, the supposed ‘new Lagos’. The Lekki corridor is arguably the fastest growing settlement in Nigeria if not Africa. It is being touted as the new main-street of Africa, offering vast investment opportunities. The corridor has attracted investments such as the Lekki Free Trade Zone (LFTZ), the ambitious Dangote Refinery originally billed to come on stream by 2019 but now delayed to 2021, the Lekki deep seaport, chemical and fertilizer plants, among others.
About 70 companies cutting across diverse sectors are said to have signalled interest to do business within the LFTZ with many of them promising billions of dollars of investment in the corridor, which also boasts of West Africa’s biggest shopping mall. Even at that, the Lagos State government says this is just a scratch of the surface as the zone presents limitless opportunities still to be tapped by local and foreign investors.
However, with all these investments and potentials to grow into a city with its own soul, there is no known and concrete plan at public or private sector level to provide the critical infrastructure that will drive and give those investments any meaning. The most agonising is the road network.
The Lekki-Epe Expressway, built in the 1980s during the administration of Lateef Jakande and when the axis was just a rural settlement, became one of the busiest and congested roads at the turn of the 21st century. Then, workers and school children had to begin their journey as early as 4am to have any hope of getting to their workplaces or schools in Victoria Island or Marina by 8 or 8.30 am.
Commuters and motorists along the route groaned in pains for many years until the Lagos state government, in 2006, heeded their call and concessioned the reconstruction and enlargement of the 49.4 kilometre road (and the building of a 20 km coastal road) to the Lekki Concession Company Ltd. (LCC) on a build, operate and transfer basis.
This is, in many ways, the Nigerian story. Governments are incapable of planning for future developments and even if they claim to plan, the plan remains only on paper and bears no connection with reality
The government justified the Public Private Partnership deal as a strategic partnership with the private sector to ease the discomfort of Lagosians and boost the economic prosperity of the Lekki-Epe vicinity especially as the road will serve as the gateway to the proposed Lekki Free Trade Zone, new model cities and residential accommodations, business centres and financial and tourism hubs. Guarantee was provided and work began in 2008. Sections 1 and 2 (0-15 kilometre) of the road were constructed but Sections 3 and 4 (15 -49 kilometre) and the coastal road remain unconstructed.
However, like all things Nigerian, the concession has since gone awry. Several delays and agitations over the payment of tolls at three designated gates in less than 25 kilometres led to the stoppage of work. The entire concession agreement has since collapsed with the Lagos state government revoking the concession and paying off the concessionaires.
Meanwhile, buoyed by the expansion of the road, many housing estates, private houses, universities and businesses have sprung up along the axis. It can be said that many people and businesses are escaping the busy and congested Victory Island and Ikoyi and even Lagos mainland to the Lekki peninsular axis. Consequently the road has got very busy that the traffic gridlock of past years has returned with a vengeance.
But perhaps, the elephant in the room is the Dangote refinery and petrochemical complex. Dangote has no intention of constructing pipelines to bring and evacuate fuel from the 650, 000 barrel-per-day refinery. Fuel, according to the Group Executive Director of the company, Devakumar Edwin, would go via “shuttle” boats to Nigerian cities of Warri and Calabar, and other deliveries would go in trucks.
Currently, Kilometre section of the road from Sangotedo to Ibeju Lekki (built since 1980) has virtually collapsed and is almost impassable and no work is being done to repair the narrow road not to talk of constructing the remaining section of the road to Epe. Pray, how can trucks evacuate fuel from one of the world’s largest refineries through a single, narrow and virtually collapsed road to all parts of the country?
This is, in many ways, the Nigerian story. Governments are incapable of planning for future developments and even if they claim to plan, the plan remains only on paper and bears no connection with reality. In 2006, the Lagos state government developed an Integrated Rail Transport System to link the major population and activity centres in Lagos state. Seven lines including the 26 kilometre Green line that will run from Marina to the Proposed Lekki Airport was planned.
Due to lack of funds, the government decided to start with the 27 kilometre Blue Line from Okokomaiko to Marina via Iddo. The contract was awarded, and work started in 2008 and was supposed to have been completed in 2011 and other lines begun. But till date, the Blue Line is yet to be completed and the other lines remain only plans on paper.
Even as the refinery is about being completed, neither the company nor the Lagos state government is concerned about the road network until Lekki becomes like Apapa, although Lekki’s case will be worse than Apapa’s. There are multiple access roads to and from Apapa, but there is only one road to and from Lekki. One can only imagine the bedlam on that axis when the refinery is completed.
The Lagos state government’s solution to the problem is to launch with fanfare the beginning of construction of an 8.7 kilometre long road that will connect the Lekki-Epe expressway at Victoria Garden City (VGC) junction to the Freedom Way in Lekki Phase 1 estate. So much for the ‘new Lagos’.
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