When I first went for a test ride on the Lagos Blue rail line last year, I had asked questions about the high staircases to get to the platforms and how unfriendly they would be to senior citizens and the physically challenged to use the rail system, if there were no elevators and escalators. The challenges I raised last year stared me in the face recently and it was not funny!
I am just recovering from the stress and trauma of an ordinarily simple travel by train from Lagos to Abeokuta and back – a round trip that would usually take three hours and a distance that should not be more than 200 kilometres all-round. I can hear someone say ‘Oga you be Aje Butter’, but is the train service made only for ‘Aje Pako’ or to make ordinary Nigerians continue to suffer and smile?
Tuesday 23rd April 2024 started quietly enough. It had rained overnight and it was still drizzling when I hitched a ride from home to the Mobolaji Johnson Train Station on Murtala Muhammed Way Yaba. The business class ticket I purchased the previous day was for the 8am train but I was advised by the staff to get there before 7am and I did.
It was still dark and there no power in the station. Passengers hung around, as the attendants said they would start checking us in by 7am. They did start in time, bar a few minutes behind, but since it was still dark, they had to use the torchlight on their phones. Passengers would present your printed ticket or the barcode on your phone, and the officials would scan it and you go through the turnstile. No problem.
The problem starts when you know that without power, you have to climb the stairs – lots of them – as the lifts/elevators or escalators are dead. You have a suitcase or two. You look up, sizing the height and number of stairs to lug the cases up to; you have no choice, just like me. Everyone else is doing it. So, here goes.
Luckily, my traveling case had trolleys and a handle so it was a bit easy to drag it up, in spite of the slapping noise on each step. Some passengers lifted up their bags on their head – who cares!
Then you get to the top of the stairs and see that you have to walk some long way across the walkway on top of the rail tracks to the other end where you can sit down in the waiting area and wait for boarding time. Another luggage dragging time, but this time it’s on level ground. We do that all the time at airports, even from one terminal to another, if there is not shuttle provided.
True to their promise, just before 8am, they shout around the hall that it’s time to board – business and first class this way, coach the other way. No public address system. Remember? No electricity! But the problem this time, is to lug your luggage down the stairs, the same number of steps you came up, I think. Is it easier going downstairs? I am not so sure. But at least you are going to sit down in the train, and rest for a while.
The train leaves on time, stopping at the different stations – not all of them, I think. But the stations I can remember were Babatunde Raji Fashola Station, Agege, Lateef Kayode Jakande Station, Agbado, Olufunmilayo Ransome-Kuti Station, Papalanto, and my destination – Professor Wole Soyinka Station Abeokuta. The train is going on to Ibadan; but I am not. Abeokuta was my stop to attend a conference.
Luckily, the train platform at Abeokuta was on the left side of the station so no climbing of stairs – I did the climbing some days later on my way back, because, wait for it – there was no power at the Abeokuta station too!
Yes, we also had to climb the stairs up and down in Abeokuta to get to the other side of the tracks where the train from Ibadan picked us up. That was on the way back. But wait for it again! On getting to Lagos, there was still, or also, no power at Mobolaji Johnson Station. Not again! Another episode of climbing the stairs, dragging the luggage and another routine down the stairs. Any wonder that after all the going up and down, the body reacted after getting home?
But back to arrival in Abeokuta on day one. It had also rained in Abeokuta on the arrival morning and there were no cabs to town from the station. I spent 90 minutes there at Wole Soyinka Station. Not me alone. Even some passengers from Ibadan, including some Youth Corpers, were stranded. No cabs here to town. They say road is too bad and with the rain, no cab driver would risk it. A couple of men hanging around had some rickety cars. One said he could oblige me if I paid him 10,000 Naira. He came down to 7000 Naira. Meanwhile business class train ticket from Lagos is 4500 for 90 minutes ride. Ride to town is about 15 minutes ordinarily, someone said. I protested. The man walked away. The Bolt cab drivers we tried to order say they won’t come our way. Alternative is to take a bike/Okada to the main express way. Bike? Luggage? And in the drizzle? I said ‘thank you very much’.
I had to call some friends in Lagos and Abeokuta who had connections in the Ogun State capital. A friend already at the conference venue was able to convince a Bolt cab driver to come rescue us. Luckily, I had sent him a message that I was stuck. I did not even ask the driver how much he would take, but that road is really bad! I paid 7000 Naira eventually. You will even pity the cars that ply those roads, if one can call them roads.
Several questions come up on why access to such a huge investment like the train station would be so poor. Is it the usual Federal-State project wahala? It is a shame that the full benefits of the rail station and line are not being received by the citizens. One would expect different kinds of businesses to be booming at all the stations. They shouldn’t go to waste.
But hang on – one may be prompted to ask what kind of business would thrive in a location that is always in darkness. What happened to back-up power, if the excuse is that there was no public power? The Railway Corporation has some answers to provide on this score.
Ogun State Government also has some answers to provide on the very poor state of the road to the station.
By the way, I did not tell you how I got to the station from the town on my return date which was Friday 26th April. I made sure I completed full arrangement a day before, for a friend to provide me with transportation early on departure morning. Although the car picked me up from the hotel in time, we almost would not have made it. The known roads to the station had been blocked, some by villages people and another by estate owners whose roads had been turned to thoroughfare by drivers trying to avoid the bad road. They locked their gates and we ended up turning here and there and there was a time our car practically hung on two wheels, with one side in the air! This was in a bid to avoid a deep gulley and the bottom of the car got stuck on a rising dump. Scary, it was.
Anyway, there is no doubt that train ride is smoother and safer than road travel, with no problem of traffic like we encounter on the road – sudden road repairs or accident etc. The fact that tickets can now be booked and paid for online is also commendable as that was a major minus in the early days when the train route opened.
But the facilities in the stations need to be better managed. Power is key to such a business and we cannot afford to say they cannot run, except there is public power supply. The rail system must be able to run well and pay its way, without dependence on government.
IMAGE CREDIT: nrc.gov.ng
