Many Nigerians (and foreigners alike) especially those who visit Abuja, Nigeria’s capital city periodically often come off with the impression –which they also express gaily- that Abuja is a beautiful, model city- one of Africa’s best.
One can not blame them for their rather myopic and false impression. What they see for the period of their stay, usually from the comfort of their air conditioned taxis leaves them with no better knowledge. From the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, the airport express way (which is now being expanded), the sprawling main bowl of the National stadium, to the massive heaps of concrete and granite in the form of buildings all over the city, it sounds logical that yeah, this is a model city.
But from someone who resides here and who in fact was born here, Abuja is one big fraud and one of the most successful attempts by our leaders to –as they are known to always do- cover up the real situation and give away the impression that we were a great nation and of course with a beautiful capital city.
Abuja is not a model city. Its does not in my estimate meet the primary requirements of being referred to as a model city. It has paved streets. Some of the roads have royal palms. El-rufai tried to salvage some green areas. There are many bridges. Julius Berger’s presence is felt at every turn. It has gigantic electronic billboards. Our mighty rich own houses here. Aso Rock is in the neighbourhood. But Abuja is not a model city. Not at the least.
Abuja is fake. It is a tale of overwhelming poverty covered up by amazing (mostly stolen) wealth. Abuja lacks the most basic of amenities that should qualify it as a model city. Recently, NEXT newspapers reported the dearth of ambulances in the city’s General hospitals while Aso Rock had almost an Ambulance showroom. The absence of ambulance is a mirror of the state of health care delivery in the city. In some of the hospitals, to see a doctor, you must set forth at dawn (apologies to Soyinka) and endure a long wait in a queue made up of persons that had set forth before dawn.
Abuja has perhaps one of worst Basic Education systems in the country. Sometime last year while I was still on National youth service, I sauntered into a primary school (In the Municipal Area Council) and was shocked to find pupils taking classes from the bare floor. That informed my decision to carry out a Personal Community Development Service effort, by providing the school with furniture and very basic materials such as a school bell which they shockingly lacked. It made me wonder what the Governments Basic Education Noise was all about. If Abuja had it so bad, what situation did one expect in remote arid areas of Zamfara or the creeks of Bayelsa?
A while later, the new minister of the FCT, Adamu Aliero was reported to have come close to shedding tears after visiting a primary school and finding that the pupils lacked chairs. What has happened since then? Perhaps the sad school would have gotten some intervention. What of the rest? This same minister just recently asked the senate to divert funds meant for education and health into road construction. This is shocking as majority of Public schools in Abuja are in states that can be best described as shameful and far from model.
Perhaps the money earmarked for it has been embezzled or the developers of Abuja master plan were just plain dumb. The city has a very frustrating transport system. Which model city In the world exists with a rail system? If you have any official business to conduct in any office in the city, it would be stupid of you to get their earlier than 10.00am as you will definitely not meet anybody in the office. Workers in Abuja go through hell to get to work in a city that was built from scratch and had all the opportunity for a properly designed transport system. The traffic on the Nyanaya and the Kubwa roads in the mornings are now legendary. The same scenario repeats itself in the evenings. It’s not only in Lagos that a trip of fifteen minutes takes three hours. It also happens in our model city; Abuja.
El-rufai’s administration saw to the expansion of the urban mass transit system (Some thing similar to Fashola’s BRT). Till this date the system which was initially said to be an electronic ticketing system has not evolved beyond the scratch. In fact, the buses have now so degenerated that they are now an eye sore. It’s not unusual to see some spoilt and abandoned along the road. The buses have also not increased in number. So we have the typical picture of 99 standing, 49 sitting. In what model city on earth do you have such a situation; people camped up in public buses as though they were inanimate?
Time was when we could boast that Abuja was clean. Today refuse dump sites greet us on Abuja streets. The Abuja Environmental Protection Board seems only very successful at seizing hawkers and their wares. Grasses get bushy before they are cut. Just the other day Sen. Grace Bent almost shouted her head off in expression of extreme disappointment when she and her colleagues visited what was supposed to be the Abuja waste dump site. She summoned three ministers (FCT, Health & Environment) to appear before her committee. Recently also the monthly sanitation was re-introduced. Today was one of such sanitation days and for most parts of Abuja, it was business as usual.
Not too many parts of Abuja have constant (24 hour) tap water supply. Save for Kubwa and the wuse and Garki districts, must of the other districts in the city center and the satellite towns do not have water. Gwagwalada taps run twice in a week and for few hours. You will be surprised to know that highbrow areas of Maitama and the large expanse of Gwarinpa do not enjoy any city water supply. The water that flows from the taps in such areas is an effort of landlords to provide boreholes.
No need talking about power. The so called capital city is not spared. The situation here is as bad as it is in my village. Ever visited any of the major markets in Wuse or Garki ? Your ear drums would continue to vibrate hours after you must left in rhythm with the many tiny generators that power each shop. I need not say more.
No other city would boast of the number of land and property hawkers as Abuja does. In this model city, agents and fraudsters hold the key to land and property purchases. You see a sea of them-able bodies men- in front of the FCDA complex and The Municipal Area Council secretariat just milling around white papers (land documents) in hand. The direct consequence of their activities is that land and property in Abuja goes for double their actual value. Should this be the norm in a model city?
And yes, Abuja they say was designed to have satellite towns where most of the persons who work in the city center are supposed to reside in. These satellite towns are supposed to have all the basic amenities. In fact there is a Satellite Towns Development Agency to that effect, yet virtually all the satellite towns are near slums. A visit to places like Mpape (which is just behind the popular Asokoro) and you will marvel at the perfect symbiotic co-habitation between man and filth. Not to mention the unplanned development and complete absence of amenities.
Given, other cities of the world have slums as well as their own inadequacies but that which exists in Abuja, well hidden and tucked away from the sight of a visitor is one to be ashamed of. Next time you visit this ‘beautiful’ city, how about sparing some time to branch off into any of the settlements you see along the airport road. What you see will redefine your impression of this city forever.
Sylva Nze Ifedigbo
www.nzesylva.wordpress.com
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