June 8, 2012
Inhabitants of the DANA crash site of Sunday at Iju-Ishaga area of Lagos State have decried their forceful evacuation from their residential buildings by government’s security operatives without commensurate relief.
Inhabitants of the DANA crash site of Sunday at Iju-Ishaga area of Lagos State have decried their forceful evacuation from their residential buildings by government’s security operatives without commensurate relief.
Following the DANA air mishap on Sunday, the Lagos State Government, through the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency [LASEMA], announced that it would provide a relief center for the inhabitants of the affected houses while a controlled demolition of the weakened buildings lasted. The Managing Director of LASEMA, Dr. Oluwafemi Oke-Osanyintolu, who visited the crash site at Popoola Street on Tuesday, disclosed that 36 people were displaced by the crash, and that they had been moved to Agbowa and Igando areas of the State. However, the relocated persons returned to their homes today with horrible ‘relief’ stories. SaharaReporters learned that the relocation gesture by LASEMA had only worsened matters for them, as the promised ‘relief center’ turned out to be a mother-less babies’ home in Ayobo-Ipaja which was described by one of them as ‘Government Rejected Area . To compound matters, the ejected Popoola Street inhabitants returned to find that their homes had been burgled. Ms. Adebayo Bidemi, a female tenant in her early 30’s, said they were idle in the new location, underfed and kept far away from their kin. “When we first got to that place in Ayobo-Ipaja, it was very far away from our own and we got there around 10pm because of the usual traffic in the area. So, I discovered that there were only children in that place and they were playing. I asked them what they were doing in that place and they said they had no parents, so that is why they are in the motherless home. After realizing that the place we were taken to is a motherless home, I told the man who took us there that I have parents and had no reason to be in the same place with orphans. So, he told us to still manage the place until Government or DANA will find solution to our problem”, she said. Another perplexing account explains how the forceful evacuations of the residents by security personnel may have aided the robbing of the vacated houses by unknown persons. Mr. Adekola Adekunle, elderly son of an old landlady, led his mother’s tenants to show their ransacked rooms in the building. “The policemen beat us and forcefully ejected us from our houses,” Adekola said. “We were not allowed into our house since the crash happened but when we returned, we discovered that our rooms had been ransacked and we had lost many personal belongings.” He listed items lost to include two electricity generators and four Bajaj Motorcycles. Mr. Adekola asked, “If the security personnel on the crash site sincerely meant to help us, they would keep robbers away from our houses as well. Although we are not even sure who actually stole our belongings because they [police] are the only ones who remained here after they chased us away”. The old landlady and widow, while complaining before journalists who visited her building, said all her children, neighbours and tenants were brutally beaten by the police who should have been securing the crash site. “One of them [a neighbour] is still in the hospital as I speak with you now,” she said. His leg was beaten to weakness with baton.” Mr. Gbenga Julius, another resident in other building who was also taken with the LASEMA officials to the Motherless Babies Home at Ipaja-Ayobo, said they were only given a pair of slippers and a wrap of Lux soap. “They then told us to sleep over in that orphanage home and that they would come and take us the following morning to Alausa so that we could express our feelings to Governor Fashola, but by the following day, we didn’t see anyone. They only sent a bus to return us to our various houses and on getting here, I discovered someone had stolen my generator and other things”, Mr. Julius expressed in shock. Some DANA officials visited the crash site today and took data of the affected persons and buildings, promising to get back to them later, even as the displaced persons hung around with no place to sleep and their properties either destroyed or lost. A surveyor at the site today confirmed that the vacated buildings, though still standing, are already weakened in their foundations and may collapse at anytime. Worried by the neglect and the uncertainty, Ms Bolatito Kareem, who spoke for her aged mother and landlady of another affected building, said she only needed to be sure whether the Government or DANA would be taking over the building or repairing the damage. “People live in this house and it is now declared risky with weakened foundation. Also their properties have been stolen. What I want to know is whether they want to come and take over this place and compensate these people or repair the damage so that this people can return to their normal life,” asked Bolatito. Respondents who identified themselves as building experts from the State Secretariat in Alausa told her they would report what they have found out about the weakened foundations to their superiors and get back to the affected people. The location of the crash site at Iju-Ishaga has had another effect: exposing how some parts of Lagos State, especially areas largely inhabited by the low income earners, are suffering administrative neglect. The Iju-Ishaga road, from Fagba, Abule-Egba or Agege, is untarred. The bad road continues to Akute, Ajuwon, Alagbole Ojodu and Berger, into Ogun State. Last year at the London School of Economics, SaharaReporters drew the attention of Governor Fashola to the fact that he has only concentrated his administration’s road construction budgets on the rich people’s popular areas, ignoring those of the poorer populations. Governor Fashola was upset as he defended his administration, but last Sunday’s air crash has enabled the world to see one of the most deplorable roads. Repairing the conspicuous centers for the rich people in the Lagos centers has won Governor Fashola cheap accolades, but the long neglected areas such as Iju-Ishaga, Ayobo-Ipaja and similar parts of Lagos have made their inhabitants to feel they are not part of the map of Lagos State. They are now being exposed as international tourists, journalists, investigators, aviation experts and the curious troop in to the crash site in droves.googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content1'); });
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