We Are Surmounting LAGBUS Challenges —Fashola

Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State has admitted that the LAGBUS service scheme is facing some challenges which the government is surmounting.

Fashola said this on Thursday when he paid a visit to the LAGBUS Bus Washing Plant at Olusosun, Ojota area of Lagos, Southwest Nigeria.

The governor said though there are problems with the scheme, such as maintenance and repair of broken down vehicles, the state government would ensure that the services of LAGBUS improved drastically to cater for the needs of teeming Lagosians.

“Before now, we have to wash those buses manually; of course a lot of time was consumed by that which causes a lot distortion in the service delivery. So, we thought about procuring these machines and of course there are other challenges of installation. There were five that we found locally that could not do the job.

“The washing plant is part of continued efforts to improve service delivery, although there are problems with bus services itself. There are buses that need to be maintained and repaired.

“And we are working on how to optimise the maintenance services and how to expand it because the number of buses are growing. Since we don’t manufacture all the buses here, there are time lapse between replacement when you import and before you can clear them,” he explained.

Fashola said all these were however, not excuses as it is the responsibility of government to find solutions to the challenges faced by LAGBUS service.

“We want to run a LAGBUS economy in an environment that does not manufacture one. So those are the challenges, there is a longer reaction time to the service required,” he stated.

The governor also visited the Oko Baba Sawmill at Ebute Metta and approved the request of the swamillers for an extension of the space granted them to stack their planks.

The Governor said that a consensus had been reached for an extension which is agreeable to the traders so that they can get on with their lives.

“An accident has happened here and they have to get on with their lives but in doing so we do not want that disorganized and disorderly arrangement to regenerate itself so we first said there was not going to be any activity here but they have written to say that well they are producing planks, they need storage areas to stack only.

“The arrangement is that they are not going to build anything here. We are going to give them some space and we gave them about 25 metres and that they wanted more.

“So, by consensus we have reached agreement on an extension which is agreeable to them so that they can get on with their livelihood, they can continue to prosper, while we deal with more enduring problems in consultation with their leadership,” he explained.

—Kazeem Ugbodaga