The Terrible State Of Oke Aro-Matogun Road

By Sanmi Awosusi

In Ifo Local Government Area of Ogun State, there is a cluster of neglected communities now crying for government help. These are: Oke-Aro, Otemuyi, Araromi Oke Odo, Matogbun, Maidan, Osere Odo, Osere Oke, Ekun town, Olambe and many others. They are inhabited by about three million people who, either directly or indirectly, pay their taxes to the state government. Moreover, they form a chunk of voters who contribute to the electoral victory of many politicians at all levels of government-local, state and federal.

Notwithstanding that successive politicians have always used these communities as what I will call their “strategic vote reserves,” the villages and towns are discarded like squeezed orange as soon as the juicy electoral season is over! This has always been the experience of these law abiding people over the years. Their roads are terrible, they do not enjoy stable electricity, they do not have pipe borne water and the security situation is so bad (there is no single police station or post) that the citizens are at the mercy of bandits, kidnappers and other desperadoes.

The roads linking these towns and villages are in shambles. Unfortunately, palliative efforts of the Community Development Committees (CDC) and Community Development Associations (CDAs) have not yielded positive results. Reason: The project is so capital intensive that they cannot be shouldered by the poor masses inhabiting the communities.

It is rather paradoxical that this area accommodates an aerodrome which is part of the major vein of the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA). This section of Ifo Local Government Area is host to Energo, an IPP Project and one of the largest in Sub-Sahara Africa. Yet, the impact of these gigantic projects are not felt in this area.

All their promises are nothing but political mere gas which has not translated into any concrete realization.

The government of Ogun State, despite its efforts at transforming the state into a modern entity, has refused to beam its developmental searchlight on this area. The people have cracked their voices in vain over this road-and they are still shouting.

People now live with this stark reality. For instance, the Oke Aro-Matogun road witnesses accidents on daily basis. It is a no go area anytime it rains whether heavy or light. This means wives or husbands cannot really predict whether they will come back to sleep in their houses, because once it rains, they are stranded outside. When such happens, their best bet is to call their family and tell them that they should be excused for the night. Otherwise, they will take the risk of sleeping on the road since it will be cut off completely.

The economy of more than three million people has been paralysed by this lack of good roads. Of course, those companies that have distributorship links with these towns have stopped patronizing their customers because they can no more guarantee the safety of their products. In other words, their vehicles get involved in accidents.

The social activities of these towns and villages are at their lowest ebb. Robbers come around with pleasure as if it is a normal (legal) daily business routine. This is because they face no challenge from the law enforcement agents. These helpless masses have been marooned to say the least. Safety of the residents is not guaranteed; everybody now exists under perpetual perturbation.

Unfortunately, the majority of the residents are the tax payers, whose sentiments were assiduously assuaged during campaign for elections. Most of the politicians traversed the nooks and crannies of the aforementioned towns and villages during their campaigns. The politicians have now won their elections and jettisoned the utopian promises they made then. The masses are now left to their fate. Put differently, should I write that such electoral vows have been deferred till the next elections in 2015?

This tragic situation is what the people in these areas are presently subjected to pending the period God will shift the attention of the state government to this road and good life will resume once again.

Rather than appeal for what is best regarded as our “inalienable right”, I will only admonish, on behalf of the masses, quoting Mordecais’ charge to Esther “… for if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time, then shall enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place…, and who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?”

•Awosusi wrote from Ikeja, Lagos