Lagos Deserves A Special Status

This demands remain the best possible way to drive Nigeria ’s development as Lagos State remains Nigeria ’s most industrialised state with needs that align with Nigeria ’s growth needs and potential.Ignoring the mounting needs of Lagos or trying to pretend they don’t exist is inflicting horrible gashes on Nigeria’s quest for progress and its aspirations to become a big economy.

No nation grows by treating the needs of its golden geese with ignominy and says that the future growth of the country’s economy is tied to the development of Lagos as the state that hosts 85 per cent of Nigeria ’s industries.

It is ironical that successive governments have been treating Lagos and its expanding needs for critical infrastructural demands with levity while they romance the dream of having Nigeria as one of the twenty biggest economies in the world by 2020. Lagos hosts over 85 per cent of Nigeria ’s industrial hub, hosts over 65 per cent of its financial hub and hosts over 75 per cent of Nigeria ’s active workforce, its intelligentsia and graduates. With each day, the population and needs of Lagos continues to increase to reflect this important role. As the economic capital of Nigeria, Lagos has been the first port of call for eager millions of youths from all parts of the country who long for means of survival from the vicissitudes and vagaries of a floundering economy as Nigeria’s.

It is worrisome that successive governments have left these very great demands to the state government and the lean monthly allocations it receives from the federation account and that the federal government has abandoned Lagos to the state government and have allowed its infrastructure to decay. Ii is also worrisome that the Federal Government has played deaf to the need to fund the repair of the infrastructur base in Lagos and has played deaf to the general demand that Lagos be accorded its well deserved status as a Special State that must be accorded such status and the economic empowerment needed to drive such status.

It is interesting that Governor Babatunde Fashola is rising to the many demands of Lagos and has been attending to these needs with the limited funds at his disposal. There has been tremendous infrastructure renewal in Lagos for the past twelve years but Lagos still needs massive funding from the Federal Government to take care of it huge infrastructure base and ensure that Lagos drives the growth of the country’s economy. Lagos is the only state where every Nigerian family is represented so it is the state that means most to all Nigerian families as well as the economy of the country and must not be neglected.

President Goodluck Jonathan and the incoming National Assembly have to see the need to grant Lagos the Special Status it deserves and make all the necessary provisions for that status in the coming dispensation. They should eschew partisanship and do what is necessary to give Lagos its befitting status in line with the diverse role it is playing in Nigeria. Lagos is projected to be one of the world’s biggest cities in 2015 and it cannot play the critical role it is programmed to play in Nigeria ’s growth and economic progress when it is abandoned and neglected. The Special Status for Lagos should be seen as a necessary step that should be taken to place Nigeria on a sound footing for growth and economic progress and must be taken as very important by both the President and the National Assembly.

•Joe Igbokwe writes from Lagos.