Apapa: When government dances on graves of businesses, residences

By simple and elementary definition, Apapa is just a geographical expression within a ‘small’ island state called Lagos. Apapa is also a local government area in Lagos created, like the 19 others in the state, for administrative convenience and political expediency.

But by accident of its location, Apapa means much more. It is also a port city, the country’s premier port city harbouring the two busiest seaports in the country- the Tin Can Island and the Apapa Ports-where both export and import trade finding meaning and significance.

In its good old days, Apapa was described as an area of aquatic splendor where the white settlers, top level federal civil servants and technocrats found homes along its well laid out roads and avenues lined with flowers and ornamental trees. It was a city with a night life that drew residents from other parts of Lagos to spend their weekends at the many pubs around.

But all that have virtually vanished and Apapa has got a new name, a lurid redefinition, a sobering status and a worrisome phase and feature that belie organic development characteristic of a port city where money is made and seen to be made all year round.

Slowly but steadily, Apapa is becoming a wasteland, a decrepit city where, according to William Shakespeare, the celebrated English playwriter, “fair is foul and foul and fair”. This is a premier port city where all forms of infrastructure have been allowed by government to decay and collapse; where the environment has been degraded almost irredeemably by desperate merchants whose trucks and tank farms have overrun the city.

Surreptitiously, Apapa has become an unfortunate metaphor for stress, suffering and suffocation; it is today devoid of any charm and therefore avoided like leprosy by those who do not have pressing need to be there. Going to Apapa has become synonymous with ‘journeying to hell’. The city’s new name is congestion everywhere- at the ports, on bridges, roads, streets, business premises and residences.

Many businesses have died in this city; many more still lucky to continue, have fled to saner side of town. Many residents who have the means have relocated, leaving behind empty homes for rats, rodents and ‘lucky maiguards’ who now enjoy the comfort of castles and mansions.

Yet, there is a federal government whose duty it is to put all these right. This same government, in the midst of the waste and ruin which Apapa has become, mindlessly smiles away, on daily basis, with huge revenue raked from an apparently and literally dead environment.

Besides oil, the federal government rakes in huge revenue from the non-oil sectors of the economy, especially the ports where the volume of business activities has, in recent time, increased significantly on the back of improvement in the country’s macro-economic environment.

The sea ports, notably the Tin Can Island and Apapa ports in Lagos, account for over 80 percent of non-oil revenues going into federal government’s coffers. Government’s presence at these ports is thick and unmistakable with many of its agencies at strategic locations at the ports “doing their job”.

Import duties and levies are collected by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS); royalties, rents and dues by the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA); dues and levies collected by the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA); while certification levies are collected by the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON).

Only recently, one of the agencies, the NPA, declared its 2017 revenue put at N299.56 billion which exceeded the 2016 figure of N162.20, representing 84.68 percent increase. In the last five years, the authority’s revenue profile has been increasing and, according to Abdullahi Goje, general manager, Corporate and Strategic Communications at NPA, the authority in 2013generated N154.50 billion while the revenue increased to N159.30 billion andN180.50 billion in 2014 and 2015 respectively.

What this means is that in the last five years, the NPA alone generated about N956.06 billion for the government. Unconfirmed report has it that the Customs Service (NCS) surpassed its revenue target of N1.2 trillion in 2017, while NIMASA and SON are yet to declare their own expected billions of naira generated from port business in 2017.

In the midst of all these, Apapa Osgodi Expressway, which is the single major route to these ports is a death-trap with many gullies and ditches. Upon these, over five thousand trucks of different shapes and sizes have overrun the expressway, sparing no space for other road users.

A contract for the rehabilitation of the expressway was awarded in 2010 at a little over N60 billion to the construction giants, Julius Berger and Borini Prono. A mini Trailer Park was also incorporated into the contract. This contract was scantly funded by the Goodluck Jonathan administration, and almost three years into government, it has been one story after another from the Buhari government.

It took the intervention of Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Dangote Group and Nigerian Flour Mills Limited start the reconstruction of the Ijora-Wharf Road which is the second major routes to Apapa. That intervention is to cost the three companies N4.3 billion. That became necessary because, according to Aliko Dangote, the president/CEO of Dangote Group, it was a shame to leave the road in that condition.

A few days after the takeover of the road by Dangote and others, the Federal government announced that it would be spending N100 billion on the rehabilitation of the Apapa-Oshodi Expressway. This means that, altogether; the two major routes require just N104.3 billion to make them motorable.

It beats the imagination, therefore, that the Federal Government is finding it difficult to put those two routes in good shape even with the huge revenue it raked from only one agency, the NPA, in one year in the last five years. The latest development on the Apapa-Oshodi Expressway is that Dangote Group is to undertake its reconstruction up to Oworonshoki.

For as long as Dangote takes to prepare for the reconstruction, for so long will the expressway continue to rot away, leaving port users, Apapa residents, businesses and sundry road users in the mess that defines the port city.

The port users, whose businesses are suffering at the ports, are jittery. “Government has refused to take decisive steps towards ameliorating the challenges commuters face in accessing Apapa; they are rather piling-up pressure on Customs and other agencies at the ports and oppress shippers, who pay all the taxes with ridiculous tariff in order to generate more revenue,” Jonathan Nicole, President, Shippers Association of Lagos State, noted in a telephone interview.

He said that, the pressure to generate money from shippers was why Nigeria’s Customs tariff remains terribly high compared to tariff in neighbouring ports of Cotonou. The poor condition of the access roads into Apapa and Tin-Can Island ports, according to him, has been pushing up the cost of doing business for shippers and manufacturers, whose goods and raw materials spend days and weeks before getting to their warehouses.

Tony Anakebe, a Customs Licensed Agent, affirms, saying that even though the seaports are the goose that lay the golden eggs for the government, it has failed to invest in the development of port infrastructure, especially roads.

“Many Nigerians have lost their lives commuting on bad roads in Apapa in the midst of tankers and trailers; government has to wake-up to its responsibilities of fixing the roads and providing transit parks for heavy vehicles. This has become necessary if Nigeria’s Ease of Doing Business Ranking must improve”, he advised.

Besides the economic loss, the situation in Apapa also has health implications and, according to Richard Adebayo, a consultant psychiatric and clinical psychologist, at Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital, Yaba, Lagos, travelling on long tragic jam can translate into health hazards with both physical and mental consequences.

“Spending long hours in traffic can be stressful and can cause orthopaedic problems, like back pains, leg pain and affects circulation of blood, which can lead to deep vein trounces. It also affects sleeping pattern, tiredness, and for those who have the tendency of developing high blood pressure, it can also worsen and lowers effective ability of daily activities,” he said.

He added that the mental consequences of stress can lead to anger and frustration. “Also, spending much time in traffic affects the temperature of the spectrum in men and may affect sperm production, leading to infertility in some men.”

The stationary trucks on the bridges in and around Apapa has been described as a ticking time-bomb that could explode any time if something urgent is not done. Both structural and civil engineers have warned that parking these heavy duty vehicles for days has adverse impact on the integrity and structural stability of those bridges with the risk of failure or total collapse if not checked.

Gabriel Ojo, a civil engineer at Sanni, Ojo & Partners Consulting Limited, argues however that it is most unlikely that the structure and integrity of the bridges will be adversely affected from the point of view of overload from the ‘empty’ trucks, but many of those trucks are not in perfect condition.

He explained that because many of them are not in perfect condition that are likely to have oils, including petrol, diesel, engine oil, brake oil etc, dripping on the bridges; these oils are organic solvents that naturally dissolve the asphalt topping and cause the bridges topping and the decks to deteriorate very fast.

“Some of these oils also get washed down the joints and may attack the elastomeric or other rubberized materials of the joints and will certainly reduce the service life of the bridges. It is these oils that are far more troublesome and worrisome than the overload; the oils certainly have great adverse impact on the integrity of the bridge and road structure,” he warned.

 

CHUKA UROKO