Adewale said he sees a similar scenario playing out in the modern mass transit services of the Bus Rapid Transit and LAGBUS in the state and fears for their fate.
Adewale said, “LSTC also started brightly like the present-day BRT and LAGBUS and even had air-conditioned buses, before they started disappearing from the roads. Recently, BRT and LAGBUS have started showing signs of poor maintenance too, just like it happened with the LSTC. People stand in long queues now for BRT and LAGBUS buses, while their garages are parked with grounded buses.”
But prior to the introduction of the LSTC, investigation shows that there have been a run of public mass transit schemes in Lagos, which all disappeared after some years of operation.
For instance, in the 1960s, there was the Lagos Municipal Transport Service, which competed with the 911 Mercedes Benz trucks, popularly called ‘Molue’ (a large commercial passenger bus).
The scheme failed and was replaced by the LSTC which was introduced by the state government in 1977. Similarly, the LSTC, which reportedly started with about 600 luxury buses within the metropolis, also disappeared from the roads.
Shortly after, there was the Jubilee Transport Service, but sadly, its stay was also brief. This led to the introduction of Eko Transport, which also had a brief stay.
Other commuters, like Adewale, have expressed disappointment with the recent services of BRT and LAGBUS. They claim to see a trend between the bus services and other past public transport schemes which are no more in Lagos.
A resident, who recalled part of the JTS era, Mr. Olumuyiwa Ajayi, likened the pace of deterioration of the LAGBUS and the BRT to some of the old bus services.
According to Ajayi, poor maintenance is a key characteristic that the past schemes in the state had in common. In his opinion, the BRT and LAGBUS appear to be nearing the deep fall that consumed other bus services in the past.
Ajayi said, “I remember when the BRT and LAGBUS first started; they were neat and some top company executives even preferred to leave their vehicles at home and go to work in them. But these days, the buses have become so bad that many people have gone back to their cars. Poor maintenance is usually where the problem starts from.
“Some of the buses have become so dirty that commuters are now afraid to touch anything inside. Some of them now break down on the road when people have important appointments to keep. All these are signs of poor maintenance and management.”
Another commuter, who also berated the bus schemes for dropping in standard, Sonia Osagie, identified the relatively low fare of the bus schemes as an integral factor that had been keeping the BRT and LAGBUS in business.
She said, “There have been a lot of changes; now, people stand in the queue for long before the buses arrive. The electronic buttons that we used to press to notify the driver that we wanted to alight are all faulty. Now we have to shout stop-stop when we get to our bus stops, just like it is with the commercial buses.
“But most people still prefer to take the BRT and LAGBUS because they are cheaper. Sometimes when you don’t have enough cash, you have to take the buses.”
Osagie said she was embarrassed when she recently took the BRT on a rainy Sunday morning to church. She said rainwater that came in through the broken windows had flooded the bus and the seats were wet.
She said, “Most of us had sat before realising that the seats were wet. We started scrambling about for polythene bags to place on the seats, but I still got to church wet.”
Since the BRT was launched in 2008, another commuter, Ms. Funmilola Adeyemo, had made it her daily shuttle from the Lagos Mainland to the Island, where she works as an IT consultant.
However, Adeyemo said that her loyalty to the bus service was recently tested by a downpour that somehow found its way into the bus on a day she had hoped to make an impression on a new client. She admitted that the incident almost shook her loyalty to the BRT, for good.
She said, “It was raining heavily and I got wet because some of the windows of the bus were missing. The bus was also crowded and it was difficult to avoid getting ‘beaten’ by the rain being blown inside the bus. Some of the seats were also so bad that some commuters, who should be sitting had to stay on their feet.
“What made it worse was the plan I had made for the day before the rain almost spoilt it for me. There was an important client that I had to meet but unfortunately, I got to the office in my wet clothes. The incident made me realise that there is not much difference between the BRT and the yellow commercial buses.”
Adeyemo added that the sister scheme –LAGBUS- is also in crisis, with the “deteriorating condition of buses and its unruly staff.”
“Sometimes, you stand in the queue to take a LAGBUS for ages and no one cares to tell you what the problem is. But surprisingly, you will find many buses in their parks sitting idle,” she added.
While the LAGBUS is largely run by the Lagos State Government, through the LAGBUS Asset Management Limited, with the use of vehicles owned by the government and some franchises, the BRT scheme is being managed by the Lagos Metropolitan Area Transport Authority for the state chapter of the National Union of Road Transport Workers.
Kunle Arowojobe, who works at Wharf, Apapa, recalled that the bus drivers for BRT and LAGBUS buses once looked neat and smart in their uniforms. But Arowojobe’s opinion of the bus services has, however, waned a few years into their operation. Arowojobe, who takes the BRT from Ojota to Ojuelegba on most mornings to connect Apapa, added that the buses are not being well-maintained.
He said, “When the buses first started operations in Lagos , they were okay; then, the bus officials wore neat uniforms, but it is no longer like that. Some of the drivers and ticket sellers now look rough. They are not maintaining the buses and not buying new ones.”
In addition, Osagie said the attitude of the officials of the bus schemes, particularly the ticket sellers, towards commuters had worsened.
“Most of the workers are very rude, but the ticket sellers are the worst. The ticket sellers don’t have any regard for anybody; they talk to people anyhow,” she said.
Another resident, Oby Chukwuneta, who described the condition of some BRT buses as an “eyesore”, said the bus service has fallen short of its initial standard.
Chukwuneta, who has imbibed the habit of noting the serial numbers of buses she considers as poorly maintained, reeled out numbers 02, 95, 124, 199, and 200 as top on her list, adding that “the buses have broken doors, windows and are badly in need of panel beating.”
Speaking to Saturday PUNCH, Chukwuneta identified poor maintenance culture as a major challenge confronting the country, saying, “It was pageantry when the BRT scheme kicked off; Lagos residents greeted it with a sigh of relief but the evil of our poor maintenance culture seems to be rearing its ugly head barely a few years after the scheme was launched. Nobody is mandating them to buy new fleets but the ones on the road should be given maximum maintenance.
“LAMATA is busy counting money without realising that the goose that lays the golden egg should be kept in healthy condition. These vehicles should be taken for routine maintenance because 95 per cent of them are in dire need of panel beating.
“I don’t think the supervisors embark on supervision or take opinion polls to ascertain the feelings of the commuters. The BRT buses on these roads are eyesores and glorified Molues in actuality. With drivers that compete with Danfo (commercial) drivers in recklessness, they hardly keep to their lanes and are ever in mufti clothes. The whole scheme requires acute revamping.”
Meanwhile, the Administrative Manager of Automedics Limited, an automated mechanic workshop in Lagos, Mr. Ademola Oguntuga, blamed the problem confronting public mass transit system in the state on government’s poor maintenance culture and bad roads, among other factors.
He said, “The attitude people have with public projects is that of ‘I don’t care since it’s not mine’. Also, most of the technicians that handle the fleet are not in tune with modern technology, so they need to upgrade. Another issue is the unavailability of spare parts locally and when they buy, there is also the risk of buying fake ones. Then, bad roads also contribute a lot. The buses have to ply bad roads regularly.”
Oguntuga said improvement in the general culture of maintenance in the country would upgrade the fortunes of public mass transit in Lagos.
“We should also use specialists and stop trying to put a square peg in a round hole,” he added.
In his reaction, a transport expert, Mr. Abayomi Fowokan, identified corruption, poor training and lack of locally made spare parts as some of the factors responsible for the failure of past public mass transit schemes in the state.
He said, “It takes professionalism to successfully run a standard bus scheme but in Nigeria, we have people who are not well-trained for the job. But there is also the issue of corruption because people will continue to find loopholes in the system. Also because the spare parts are not made locally, the management of such buses sometimes has to wait for imported parts to arrive; therefore, buses can be grounded during the period between demand and supply and this can take months.”
Fowokan, therefore, suggested periodic training, electronic ticketing and the local manufacturing of auto spare parts and vehicles as some of the solutions to the challenges confronting public mass transit in the state, and Nigeria as a whole.
He, however, expressed confidence that LAGBUS and BRT would continue to run in the state, considering the models employed by the schemes. He explained that the new models are better than the one relied on by the Lagos State Government in the past, when it solely funded its public mass transit schemes.
He said, “The BRT, for instance, is a Public Private Partnership where the runways, corridors, terminals, and the bus-stops are owned by the government but the rolling stocks (buses) are owned by private operators.
“Professionals are needed to run a standard bus system but the BRT will survive because if the private operators cannot continue for any reason, they simply have to move their vehicles off the roads. The infrastructure and the name belong to the state government, which can invite other private investors to continue. The public doesn’t even have to know. Even the LAGBUS has franchisees that run the buses along with the government, so it’s not solely a government affair.”
When Saturday PUNCH contacted the LAMATA’s External Relations Specialist, Mr. Kolawole Ojelabi, over the issue, he referred our correspondent to a recent release by the company, which sought to address the drop in BRT’s quality of service.
The statement stated that LAMATA had begun moves to increase its capacity and address the challenges being experienced by commuters.
It further stated that the company had “concluded plans to acquire 50 new buses, the refurbishment of 100 serviceable vehicles and a restructuring of its operations management team by the end of the third quarter of 2013.”
The statement read in part, “The Lagos State Government, through LAMATA, is working with the operator of the BRT System, the NURTW First BRT Cooperative, to ensure a full turnaround.
“As a regulatory agency, we are working behind the scene to ensure that the ideals of the BRT system at conception and launch are not lost. Very soon, the change that commuters rightly expect will be evident. The operator has placed an order for 50 new buses as part of the process of re-fleeting the system.”
Also, an official of LAGBUS Asset Management Limited, who spoke with Saturday PUNCH anonymously, also admitted that there were challenges with the bus system, adding that the management was working to improve the situation.
The source said, “We continually organise training sessions for our staff to keep them up to speed and very soon, all our buses will work at the 90 per cent capacity.”
But the Lagos State Commissioner for Transportation, Mr. Kayode Opeifa, refuted claims that the state has had past failures with its public mass transit schemes.
Opeifa argued that various reasons, not probably known to the general public, were responsible for the disappearance of the buses from the roads.
He traced the history of mass transit system in Lagos to the 1960s, which he described as a period dominated by private bus operators, before government intervention.
He said, “The schemes didn’t die; government responded to changes and felt they needed to move to another level. For instance, the LSTC didn’t die; a military government came in and felt they needed to make changes. The Jubilee Transport was the reforming of the LSTC by (Michael) Otedola when he was the governor. (Mohammed Buba) Marwa came in and took LSTC to Eko Transport, where people could lease vehicles from the government, but it was not well-consummated.”
Opeifa identified 1999 as the period when Lagos State came up with “a well-concerted mass transit plan, but the BRT and most of the red buses (LAGBUS) are not government owned.”
However, he admitted that the operators of the schemes are going through a “learning curve”, which he attributed to funding difficulties.
He said, “The cost of borrowing is too high; profit margin for the operators is between 13-20 per cent while the cost of borrowing is at 22 per cent interest rate. But the government is looking at financing options for them at 18 per cent, so that they can get loans at a reasonable rate, although normally, it should not be more than ten per cent.
“You have to also consider the issue of spare parts which we have to import. The vehicles are supposed to last for not more than eight years, but they are already about six years and we don’t make vehicles or spare parts.
“Also, the population of Lagos is growing astronomically and this puts a lot of pressure on the public transport. Meanwhile, the road cap is not more than 250 buses on the BRT corridor.”
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