Lagos, the commercial hub of Nigeria, has been ranked 171 out of 172 countries in the list of most liveable cities in the world for the first quarter of 2022, according to the latest 2022 Global Liveability Index.
This makes the city the second most unliveable city in the world and the worst in Africa. And even though most cities were added in the index, Lagos still maintained its previous second to the last position.
According to the index published by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), the world’s leader in global business intelligence, Damascus (Syria) and Tripoli (Libya) continue to anguish at the bottom of the list along with Lagos (Nigeria) as they face social unrest, terrorism and conflict.
“However, most of the cities in the bottom ten have improved their scores compared with last year, as COVID-19 pandemic induced pressures,” it stated.
The EIU examines the quality of health care, education, infrastructure, stability, and culture when assessing living conditions of each city.
More than 30 factors are taken into account when calculating each rank, which are then compiled into a weighted score between one and 100.
From the indicators used for the ranking index which was stability, healthcare, culture & environment, education and infrastructure, Lagos scored 20.0, 20.8, 44.9, 25.0 and 46.4 respectively which dragged its score to 32.2 from a total of 100.
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Economic experts say the ranking is unsurprising due to the rising population of Lagos, putting more pressure on the available resources, low level of government reforms and rising poverty rate.
Population pressure is affecting social amenities, which is why we are still lagging behind, says Ayodeji Ebo, managing director/chief business officer at Optimus by Afrinvest Limited.
“Rural urban migration has increased significantly which has put more pressure on the available resources in terms of infrastructure, health, education and social amenities,” Ebo said.
Ibrahim Tajudeem, head of research, Chapel Hill Denham identified inadequate infrastructure as one of the major problems.
“The poverty level in the country is high and government policies or reforms are not happening as fast as they should to improve the standard of people living in the country.
“If all these things do not change, then Lagos and Nigeria as a whole will still lag when compared with other cities in the world where developmental activities are happening,” Tajudeem added.
The EIU further highlighted the top five most liveable cities in the world which are Vienna, Austria scoring 99. 1; Copenhagen, Denmark with 98.0; Zurich, Switzerland with 96.3; Calgary, Canada had 96.3 and Vancouver, Canada with 96.1
The least liveable cities were Damascus in Syria, Lagos in Nigeria, Tripoli in Libya, Algiers in Algeria and Karachi in Pakistan, which scored 30.7, 32.2, 34.2, 37.0 and 37.5 respectively.
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